/ 


LIBRARY 

OF   THE 

University  of  California 


Y.M.O.A.OF  y. 

Accession      J- 01 68^         q^5 


GEOR.GE  :WELLS :  ARMES 
MEMORIAL  LIBRARY  +  +  + 
STiLE5  HALL BERKELEY 


THE   HOME  LIFE 


IN  THE  LIGHT   OF  ITS  DIVINE 
IDEA. 


BY 

JAMES    BALD  WIN    BEOWI^,  B.  A., 

MTNISTER  OF   CLATLANDS  CHAPEL,  OLAPHAM  BOAB,  LONDON, 

ATJTHOE  OP 
'  THE  DITINE  LIFE  IN  MAN,"    "  THE  SOUL'S  EXODUS  AKD  PILGEIMAGE,"  ETC. 


«^        •     le 


NEW  YORK : 
D.    APPLETON     AND     COMPANY, 

443    &    445    BROADWAY. 
186T. 


TO   THE  MEMORY 
OF  THE  BELOYED  AND  HONOUEED   TEAOHEB, 

A.    J.    SCOTT,   A.  M., 

•WHOSE   WHOLE   LIFE 

WAS  A  WITNESS  TO  THE  TEUTH  WHICH  I  HAVE  HEEE 

ENDEAYOIJEED   TO   SET  FOETH, 

AND   WHO   FELL   ASLEEP 

WHILE  THESE  PAGES  WEEE  PASSING  THEOXTGH  THE  PEESS, 

I   INSOEIBE   THEM, 

WITH   THAT   EEYEEENT   LOYE 

WHIOH   IS   ONLY   MADE   IMMOETAL 

BY   DEATH. 


101682 


PREFACE. 


I  sPEiw  some  days  last  autumii  at  a  large  old 
mansion  in  tlie  north  of  England,  where  a  troop 
of  bright  young  girls  are  being  trained  to  a  wise 
and  noble  womanhood.  It  was  while  watching 
their  happy  and  beautiful  home  life,  and  thinking 
what  might  grow  out  of  their  culture  in  the 
homes  in  which  they  may  one  day  rule,  that  I 
formed  the  plan  of  instruction  for  my  own  con- 
gregation during  the  winter  months,  the  result  of 
which  this  book  contains.  At  first  it  was  my 
purpose  to  publish  some  of  these  discourses  sep- 
arately, and  in  a  slighter  form;  but  the  subject 
grew  on  my  hands  as  I  thought  it  out,  to  a  more 
formal  completeness  than  I  at  first  intended ;  and 
I  have  gladly  yielded  to  many  very  pressing  re- 


vi  Preface, 

* 

quests,  from  those  whose  judgment  I  respect^  that 
I  would  publish  them  in  this  more  complete  and 
permanent  form. 

My  aim  has  been,  as  my  readers  will  discover, 
to  study  the  closest  relations,  and  the  most  sacred 
duties  of  life,  in  the  light  of  Him  whose  Incarna- 
tion reveals  the  principle  of  their  closeness  and 
sacredness.  In  this,  and  in  all  regions  of  thought, 
I  desire  increasingly  to  get  as  near  to  ^is  Life  as 
possible;  being  convinced  that  the  root  of  the 
true  "Eirenicon"  in  home  life,  church  life,  and 
state  life,  lies  here.  If  by  these  pages  I  can  help 
any  to  understand  even  a  little  more  clearly,  and 
to  feel  even  a  little  more  deeply,  how  sacred  these 
relationships  and  duties  are  in  the  Lord,  it  will 
be  a  source  of  great  thankfulness  to  me.  The  re- 
newal of  homes  must  precede  all  other  renewals  in 
wider  spheres,  for  which  we  pray.  May  God 
hasten  it  in  our  times ! 

JAMES  BALDWIN  BKOWK 

10,  The  Crescent,  Clapham  Common, 
A^pril  17,  1866. 


CONTENTS 


THEY  TWO  SHALL  BE  ONE, 1 

"So  God  created  man  in  Ills  own  image: -in  the  image  of  God 
created  he  him ;  male  and  female  created  ho  them." — Gen. 
i.27. 

II. 

THESE   LITTLE   ONES, 29 

"Take  heed  that  ye  despise  not  one  of  these  little  ones." — 
Matt,  xviii.  10. 

III. 

THE   JUST   MASTER, 57 

"Masters,  give  nnto  your  servants  that  which  is  just  and  equal ; 
knowing  that  ye  also  have  a  Master  in  heaven." — Gol.  iv.  1. 

lY. 

THE    FAITHFUL   SERVANT, 92 

"  Servants,  obey  in  all  things  your  masters  according  to  the  flesh ; 
not  with  eye-service,  as  men-pleasers ;  but  in  singleness  of 
heart,  fearing  God :  and  whatsoever  ye  do,  do  it  heartily,  as 
to  the  Lord,  and  not  unto  men."— Col.  lii.  22,  23. 


viii  Contents. 


EDUCATION, 119 

"  Bring  them  up  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the  Lord." 

Eph.  vt  4. 

yi. 

THE  KURTUEB  OP  THE  LOBD, 149 

"  Bring  them  up  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the  Lord."— 
Eph.  vi.  4. 

VII. 

EECEEATION, 179 

"  To  everything  there  is  a  season,  and  a  time  to  every  purpose 

imder  the  heaven.    A  time  to  laugh and  a  time  to 

dance."— EocLES.  ilL  1-1 

YIII. 

GETTING  OUT   INTO   LIFE, 214 

"And  Isaac  sent  away  Jacob." — Gen.  xxviii.  5. 

IX. 

THE  FAMILY  MINISTEY, 246 

"When  the  ear  heard  me,  then  it  blessed  me ;  and  when  the  eye 
saw  me,  it  gave  witness  to  me :  because  I  delivered  the  poor 
that  cried,  and  the  fatherless,  and  him  that  had  none  to  help 
him.  The  blessing  of  him  that  was  ready  to  perish  came 
upon  me :  and  I  cansed  the  widow's  heart  to  sing  for  joy.  I 
put  on  righteousness,  and  it  clothed  me:  my  judgment  was 
as  a  robe  and  a  diadem.  I  was  eyes  to  the  blind,  and  feet 
was  I  to  the  lame.  I  was  a  father  to  the  poor:  and  the  cause 
which  I  knew  not  I  searched  out." — Job  xxix.  11-16. 

X. 

THE   GOLDEN   AUTUMN, 274 

"So  the  Lord  blessed  the  latter  end  of  Job  more  than  his  begin- 
ning."— Job  xlii.  12. 

XI. 

THE   WHOLE   FAMILY, 801 

"  The  whole  family."— Eph.  iii.  15. 


UNP/ERvSiry 


&-?F0f-i^4\^ 


THEY  TWO  SHALL  BE  OITO. 

"  So  God  created  man  in  his  own  image :  in  the  image  of 
God  created  he  him  ;  male  and  female  created  he  themP 
—Gen.  i.  2T. 

The  substance  of  the  world  is  formed  by  the 
combination,  in  various  modes  and  under  various 
forces,  of  very  simple  elements,  the  essential  na- 
ture of  which  escapes  our  sight.  There  is  a  cer- 
tain rudimental  cell  in  all  organic  tissues,  which, 
modiiied  and  multiplied,  builds  up  the  structure 
in  very  fearful  and  wonderful  ways.  But  this  cell 
itself  is  complex,  it  has  an  interior  life,  and 
comprehends  diverse  elements  within  its  unity. 
These  elements  can  in  a  measure  be  discriminated, 
but  the  principle  of  the  life  remains  a  mystery 
still.  The  keenest  observation  can  detect  no  dif- 
ference between  the  cell  which  will  grow  into  a 
pine,  for  instance,  and  the  cell  which  will  grow 
into  an  oak.  A  great  chemist,  who  died  untimely 
1 


2  The  Home  Life. 

some  years  ago — a  man  wlio,  like  Goetlie,  brouglit 
a  poet's  eye  to  bear  on  the  structure  of  things — 
propounded  the  idea,  which  may  come  to  be  es- 
tablished as  truth  some  day,  that  the  ultimate 
atoms  of  all  the  substances  with  which  we  are  fa- 
miliar in  the  material  creation  are  really  minute 
bodies,  as  complex  and  wonderful  in  their  way  as 
the  universe  itself — ^being  formed  by  the  arrange- 
ment, in  various  modes,  of  particles  of  the  one 
simple  elemental  substance,  which  God  called  into 
existence  by  His  fiat,  and  out  of  which  He  made 
the  worlds.*  Perhaps  the  poet  had  a  vision  of 
this  when  he  spake  to  us  of 

"  One  God,  one  law,  one  element, 
And  one  far-off  divine  event. 
To  which  the  whole  creation  moves." 

Be  this  as  it  may,  the  rudimental  element  of 
human,  society  is  complex :  the  family  is  the  cell- 
germ  out  of  which  it  grows.  Human  society  is  a 
structm-e  which  is  built  up  of  homes  rather  than 
of  individuals ;  that  is,  of  beings  in  relation,  with 
sacred  duties  springing  out  of  that  relation,  which 
determine  the  form  and  the  direction  of  their  ac- 
tion upon  each  other,  both  in  the  narrow  circle  of 

*  Lectures  on  the  Atomic  Theory,  &c.,  by  the  late  Dr.  Sam- 
uel Brown  of  Edinburgh. 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  3 

tlie  home,  and  in  the  wider  theatre  of  social  and 
political  life. 

Perhaps  we  nowhere  get  so  close  an  observa- 
tion of  these  simple  elemental  cells  out  of  which 
nations  grow,  as  in  the  solemn  social  covenant 
into  which  the  band  of  Pilgrim  Fathers  entered 
before  they  set  their  foot  on  the  shore  of  the  New 
World : — "  In  the  name  of  God.  Amen.  We, 
whose  names  are  underwritten,  the  lojal  subjects 
of  our  dread  sovereign  King  James,  having  un- 
dertaken, for  the  glory  of  God  and  advancement 
of  the  Christian  faith,  and  honour  of  our  king 
and  country,  a  voyage  to  plant  the  first  colony  in 
the  northern  parts  of  Yirginia,  do  by  these  pres- 
ents solemnly  and  mutually,  in  the  presence  of 
God  and  of  one  another,  covenant  and  combine 
om-selves  together  into  a  civil  body  politic,  for  our 
better  ordering  and  preservation,  and  furtherance 
of  the  ends  aforesaid;  and  by  virtue  hereof  to 
enact,  constitute,  and  frame  such  just  and  equal 
laws,  ordinances,  acts,  constitutions,  and  offices, 
from  time  to  time,  as  shall  be  thought  most  con- 
venient for  the  general  good  of  the  colony.  Unto 
which  we  promise  all  due  submission  and  obe- 
dience." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  trace  this  exodus  of 


4  The  Home  Life. 

the  Pilgrim  Fathers  to  its  origin,  and  to  show 
that  concern  for  the  purity  and  i)ietj  of  their 
homes  was  the  main  motive  which  drove  these 
men  forth  from  their  resting-place  in  Holland, 
and  set  them  there,  a  band  of  homeless  exiles,  on 
the  shores  of  the  ISTew  "World.  Forty-one  men' 
set  their  hands  to  that  social  contract;  and  the 
Christian  society  thus  fashioned  has  grown  into 
the  ITew  England  States,  and  has  given  both  force 
and  form  to  the  development  of  the  great  repub- 
lic of  America.  But  those  men  were  not  mere 
monads.  They  were  husbands,  fathers,  and  broth- 
ers ;  and  they  acted  for  those  whom  God  had  made 
one  with  them,  or  would  make  one  with  them. 
Each  carried  his  associated  human  spirits  with 
him  in  his  action  and  undertaking,  and  each  con- 
templated the  establishment  of  a  secure  and  hon- 
ourable home  life  as  the  essential  condition  of  the 
growth  of  a  secure  and  prosperous  state.  It  is 
just  as  impossible  to  get  at  the  naked  human  unit 
— a  man  disassociated  from  his  fellows,  having  no 
duties  and  no  claims — as  it  is  to  get  at  the  orig- 
inal elemental  substance  •  out  of  which  God  made 
the  worlds.  "  God  created  man  in  his  own  im- 
age :  in  the  image  of  God  created  he  him  /  male 
and  female  created  he  themP    Man  never  was 


The\j  Two  Shall  le  One.  6 

alone ;  man  was  never  intended  to  be  alone ;  man 
never  can  be  alone.  The  man  who  aims  at  this 
isolation — who  disclaims  all  the  duties  and  respon- 
sibilities which  arise  out  of  his  natural  relations, 
who  claims  the  right  to  think  only  of  himself, 
and  to  care  and  act  only  for  himself — the  apostle 
strikes  off  from  the  great  human  trunk,  with  the 
trenchant  axe-stroke :  "  He  hath  denied  the  faith : 
he  is  worse  than  an  infidel P, 

Let  us  start,  then,  with  this  first  principle,  that 
the  family  is  the  rudimental  human  institution, 
the  cell  from  which  society  is  to  grow,  and  of 
which  the  Hindoo  had  some  vision,  when  he  said, 
"  Man  is  nothing  untU  he  becomes  a  triad — man, 
wife,  child."  "We  can  then  study  profitably  some 
of  the  more  prominent  conditions  of  its  healthy 
order  and  development;  for  on  this — ^the  sound- 
ness and  vigour  of  the  home  life — the  welfare  of 
societies  mainly  depends. 

I  may  note  in  passing  that  we  Anglo-Saxons 
have  a  special  interest  in  the  ideas  which  cluster 
around  home.  Far  back  as  we  can  trace  our  an- 
cestry— into  the  depths  of  the  old  German  forest, 
or,  further  still,  into  the  twilight  of  the  morning 
land— always  this  home  institution  meets  us,  al- 
ways the  home  is  the  rudimental  unit  of  the  state. 


6  The  Rome  Life, 

The  freeman  dwelling  as  a  husband,  the  head  of  a 
household,  on  his  own  clearing,  lord  paramount 
in  his  own  home,  with  a  help  meet  for  him — and 
German  homes  early  nursed  a  noble  t}^e  of  wo- 
manhood— ^liolding  his  house  as  his  sanctuary,  lit- 
erally sacred  to  him  as  a  shrine  to  its  God,  is  the 
dominant  figure  in  German  society.  In  that  won- 
derful picture  of  the  German  nature  and  institu- 
tions which  Tacitus  painted  as  a  bitter  rebuke  to 
the  youth  of  degenerate  Rome,  this  is  the  central 
point  oh  which  the  whole  interest  turns.  Doubt- 
less the  lights  are  touched  in  with  startling  bril- 
liancy, and  the  shadows  are  softened  by  many 
tones.  It  was  a  lay  sermon  to  a  profligate  age, 
and  he  used  the  liberty  of  preachers ;  but  we  can- 
not question  that  the  picture  in  its  main  features 
was  a  faithful  one,  and  we  may  be  sure  that  even 
then  the  home  was  the  focus  of  all  the  vitality 
and  energy  of  German  society.  Perhaps  this 
large  capacity  for  home  life  was  the  feature  of  the 
Teutonic  nature,  which  made  it  the  chosen  thea- 
tre of  that  higher  civilization  whose  germs  the 
Founder  of  Christianity  brought  into  the  world. 
It  is  perhaps  this  reverence  for  woman  and  for  the 
sanctity  of  homes,  which  characterised  their  life 
even  in  its  rudest  stages,  which  justifies  the  die- 


Tliey  Two  Shall  le  One.  7 

turn  of  Hegel,  that  "the  destiny  of  the  German 
peoples  was  to  be  the  bearers  of  the  Christian 
principles."  'Nor  can  we  pass  by  the  fact  without 
thought,  that  the  land  in  which — with  all  her  sor- 
rows  and  all  her  sins,  and  God  knows  that  their 
name  is  legion — ^homes  are  most  rich,  most  beau- 
tiful, most  blessed,  is  the  chief  seat  of  freedom, 
industry,  commerce,  and  those  higher  influences 
which  are  slowly  permeating ,  and  fertilising  the 
world. 

And  let  not  any  lonely  and  homeless  one  think 
that  this  subject  is  outside  his  sphere.     The  home    ■ 
key-note  runs  through  the  whole  strain  of  human    I 
life.     All  love  and  are  loved ;  and  there  you  have     \ 
the  heart  of  the  mystery.     Out  of  this  bond  of 
spirits,  from  which  none   are  free,  and  which, 
blessed  be  God,  often  clasps  the  closest  those  most 
shut  out  from  poorer  and  more  vulgar  joys,  flow 
all  the  most  sacred  duties  and  experiences  of  life. 
Life  catches  its  ruddiest  hue  from  the  glow  of  the 
household  fire.     And  just  in  the  measure  in  which 
men  and  women,  however  isolated  to  the  eye  their 
lives  may  seem,  learn  the  secret  of  fatherly,  moth- 
erly, brotherly,  or  sisterly  ministry  to  the  men  and 
women  and  little  ones  around  them,  does  their 


8  The  Home  Life. 

life  rise  into  nobleness  and  beauty,  and  become 
harmonic  with  the  life  of  heaven. 

In  fuller  development  of  this  thought,  let  us 
consider — 

I.  That  the  first  Father  and  Founder  of  house- 
holds is  God. 

In  all  human  institutions  which  have  their 
root  in  the  constitution  of  our  nature,  we  have  to 
consider  two  things  in  order  to  get  a  complete 
view  of  them — the  earthly  ''patterns  of  things 
in  the  heavens^''  and  "  the  heavenly  things  them- 
selvesP  God  made  the  first  man  after  a  divine 
original,  and  after  a  divine  original,  too.  He  made 
the  first  home.  Eve,  when  her  tears  rained  wildly 
on  the  blood-flecked  brow  of  Abel,  knew  but 
one  pang  of  the  pain  with  which  the  deadly  sin 
of  His  first-born  had  wrung  the  great  Father's 
heart :  "  Hear^  0  heavens^  and  give  ear,  0  earth  ; 
for  the  Lord  hath  spolcen:  Lhave  nourished  and 
hrought  up  children^  and  they  have  rebelled  against 
meP  And  the  cities  of  earth  are  but  the  stained 
and  desecrated  images  of  the  "  city  which  hath 
foundations  eternal  in  the  heavens,  whose  huilder 
and  maker  is  GodP  God  has  not  borrowed  these 
images — "  father,"   "  children,"   "  home."      It  i? 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  9 

heaven  tliat  lends  to  earth,  not  earth  to  heaven. 
The  things  that  are  npon  earth,  the  things  which 
have  root  in  humanity  as  God  made  it,  and  which 
are  not  the  devil's  work,  are  first  there.  Heaven 
bnt  reclaims  its  own  when  it  takes  these  images, 
and  applies  them  again  to  heavenly  nse. 

When  we  search  the  secret  of  the  Divine  Ex- 
istence, and  attempt  to  explore  the  mystery  of 
God,  we  are  fain  to  cry,  with  one  of  old :  "  Such 
knowledge  is  too  wonderful  for  us :  it  is  higher 
than  heaven,  what  can  we  hnow  f  it  is  deeper  than 
hell,  what  can  we  do  f "  But  God  comes  forth 
from  the  darkness  and  declares  Himself;  we  begin 
to  see  Him  and  to  know  Him  when  He  reveals 
Himself  as  a  Father  in  a  home.  The  inscrutable 
things  of  God  we  leave  until  we  shall  "  see  face 
toface^^  and  '^  Ttnow  even  as  also  we  are  TtnownP 
We  cling  to  the  human  form  which  shapes  itself 
in  the  mist  of  our  blindness,  and  which  grows 
more  palpable  and  manlike  as  we  gaze.  He 
speaks  to  us  plainly  and  gently  as  to  children ; 
He  promises  all  that  the  largest  reading  of  the 
word  "  Father  "  can  suggest  of  benediction.  He 
bids  us  build  our  homes  and  bear  the  burden  of 
them,  if  we  would  win  the  joy ;  and  He  shows  to 
us  how  He  has  built  His  home,  has  taken  all  the 
1* 


10  The  Home  Life. 

burden  of  it  on  His  heart  and  spirit,  and  looks  to 
be  repaid  by  its  concoi-d,  fruitfulness,  and  bliss. 

There  is  no  relationship  or  experience  which 
God  has  ordained  for  man  of  which  He  has  not 
set  the  pattern  before  Himself.  There  is  nothing 
which  He  will  have  man  to  do  or  to  snfier  of 
which  He  has  not  shown  the  ensample.  There  is 
nothing  which  He  asks  man  to  aim  at  and  stead- 
fastly pursue,  which  He  has  not  made  an  end  also 
to  His  own  life.  The  first  sentence  of  God's  mes- 
sage reveals  to  us  a  love  which  takes  joy  in  sacri- 
fice :  "  God  so  loved  the  world,  that  he  gave  his 
only-hegotten  Son,  that  whosoever  helieveth  in  him 
should  not  perish,  hut  have  everlasting  life.'''' 
Dreary  theologians  may  argue  and  wrangle  about 
the  Ruler ;  the  Lord,  who  spake  not  as  the  Scribes, 
told  us  chiefly  of  the  Father — the  Father  who  lays 
the  foundation  of  His  fatherly  rule  in  a  sacrifice 
which  the  perfect  love  alone  could  ofier,  and 
which  abides  as  the  ensample  and  inspiration  of 
all  perfect  love- for  evermore.  In  our  humble  acts 
of  self-denial,  for  the  good  of  our  dear  ones  and 
of  mankind,  it  should  strengthen,  purify,  and 
gladden  us  to  know  that  we  are  treading  in  di- 
vine footsteps,  and  are  so  far  made  like  unto  the 
Son  of  God.     How  little  we  care  to  think  of  it ! 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  11 

"We  toil,  and  groan,  and  suifer,  but  we  forget  all 
that  would  glorify  our  work  and  pain.  To  under- 
stand human  homes,  we  must  lift  up  our  hearts  to 
the  contemplation  of  the  divine  home.  The  se- 
cret of  blessed  human  homes — and  there  are 
blessed  homes  on  earth — is  to  make  such  love  as 
His  love  regnant  there,  and  endeavour  to  live  for 
and  bear  with  each  other,  as  He  has  lived  for  and 
borne  with  us  all. 

It  is  very  wonderful  how  the  heavenly  expe- 
rience has  ever  anticipated  the  earthly;  for  sin 
made  God's  home  dark  and  sad  before  the  blight 
fell  upon  ours.  God  had  built,  not  a  beautiful 
mansion  only,  but  a  home  for  His  children.  It  is 
not  enough  to  say  that  the  world  glows  with 
beauty,  and  is  charged  with  treasures  of  wisdom 
to  him  who  has  the  eye  to  search  them  out.  It  is 
not  a  great  picture,  painted  with  consummate  art, 
which  God  has  set  before  us  in  the  creation ;  it  is 
a  home  which  He  has  filled  with  the  tokens  -of 
a  loving  presence,  and  lit  with  a  living  smile. 
Through  the  whole  scale  of  the  creation  we  find 
our  thoughts  and  emotions  repeating  themselves. 
The  relations  of  human  life  and  its  experiences 
have  their  images  everywhere.  Love,  which  is 
life's  mystery,  smiles  or  sighs  through  the  life  of 


12  The  HoTYie  Life. 

every  creature.  Even  the  dead  rocks  have  their 
elective  affinities,  and  like  leaps  to  like  with  pas- 
sion as  intense  as  that  which  bums  in  the  heart 
of  the  most  imperious  of  human  loves.  All  the 
experiences  of  man  in  his  home,  his  joys,  sorrows, 
fears,  hopes,  and  the  issues  that  spring  from  it, 
find  their  analogues  in  the  creation ;  for  all  things 
on  earth  and  in  heaven  have  been  fashioned  to 
make  this  universe  homelike  for  the  sons. 

The  world  in  truth  will  only  unveil  its  secrets 
to  the  man  who  has  a  child's  eye  for  its  homely 
beauty.  Those  grand  demonstrations  of  the  skill 
and  the  power  of  God  in  the  creation  which  de- 
lighted our  forefathers  fall  coldly  upon  our  ear. 
Creation  is  alive,  and  it  is  just  the  play  of  the 
life  of  creation  which  these  grand  demonstrations 
miss.  A  dead  limb  on  an  anatomist's  table  may 
tell  you  something  of  its  uses,  but  one  glance  at 
the  living  limb  of  the  athlete  in  the  arena  unfolds 
the  whole.  Show  me  a  broad  landscape  with  the 
sunlight  gilding  its  crests  and  flooding  it^  spaces, 
while  the  purple  shadows  lie  calm  in  the  hollows, 
and  you  show  me  more  of  God  in  the  creation 
than  is  disclosed,  by  the  analyses  of  the  whole 
Bridgewater  school.  They  are  admirable  as  anat- 
omy,  and  anatomy  is  admirable  for  its  uses,  but 


They  Two  Shall  he  One,  13 

no  dissection  nnveils  to  us  tlie  great  tliouglits  of 
God.  "  The  living,  the  living  shall  praise  TheeP 
And  wliy  ?  God  is  life,  and  the  play  of  life  alone 
can  reveal  lEm.  God  is  love,  and  the  silver  cord 
which  binds  all  living  things,  with  love  for  its 
electric  fire,  alone  conducts  and  displays  His  en- 
ergy, in  whom  all  things  have  their  being,  from 
whom  they  spring,  round  whom  they  circle,  to 
whom  they  tend,  and  in  whom  they  rest.  It  is 
not  a  mansion  then,  not  a  palace ;  it  is  distinctly 
a  home  which  He  has  built  and  adorned  for  us ; 
and  He  has  come  Himself  to  live  in  it,  that  every 
nook  may  reveal  a  familiar  presence,  and  that 
every  grand  and  splendid  feature  may  w^ear  some 
touch  of  homely  and  therefore  lovely  grace. 

The  root  of  the  home  and  of  the  home  life  is 
love.  It  was  love  that  made  God  a  creator. 
From  the  beginning  He  who  "  was  with  God^'' 
rejoiced  in  the  habitable  parts  of  the  earth,  and 
His  delights  were  with^  the  sons  of  men.  "When 
the  first  fair  beauty  of  His  home  had  been  stained 
and  withered  by  sin,  it  was  love,  springing  up 
from  yet  deeper  fountains,  which  moved  Him  to 
restore  it  on  a  larger  plan  and  at  a  dearer  cost — 
a  plan  into  which  none  but  a  fatherly  heart  can 
enter,  a  cost  which  only  the  fatherly  heart  could 


14  The  Home  Life. 

find  strength  to  pay.  And  tliat  home  embosoms 
our  homes  in  its  wide-reaching  arms  of  tender- 
ness. As  we  make  our  homes  glad  by  love  and 
wisdom,  we  are  helping  to  fill  with  light  and  joy 
the  great  home  of  God.  I  don't  think  that  this 
thought  will  be  any  great  hindrance  to  a  man  in 
his  endeavours  to  curb  the  tempers,  to  tame  the 
sensuality,  to  kill  the  selfishness,  which  make 
homes  so  wretched.  Perhaps  it  may  be  a  great 
help  to  him  to  know  that  in  his  efforts  against 
evil  he  is  struggling  not  for  himself  only  but  for 
God. 

Love  is  simply  the  need  that  things  have  of 
each  other— and  souls.  You  will  question  my 
inclusion  of  things  within  the  charmed  circle. 
But  human  love  has  its  analogue  in  that  yearning 
of  elements  toward  each  other,  which  lies  at  tlie 
heart  of  all  the  movement  and  circulation  of  the 
world.  The  image  of  clay  is  transfigured  in  man. 
God  has  made  things  for  each  other,  and  God  has 
made  souls.  They  press  toward  each  other.  Life 
is  a  fragment  until  they  have  blended.  Love  and 
its  reciprocations  develope  the  full  form  of  life. 
A  man's  life  is  rich  just  in  the  measure  in  which 
he  loves  and  is  loved.  Things  made  for  each 
other  draw  toward  each  other.     They  seek  com- 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  15 

munion,  they  seek  to  blend  witli  each  other  in 
concert  for  a  common  end,  thej  seek  to  rest  in 
each  other's  love  and  be  blessed.  And  the  coop- 
eration of  those  who  love  is  the  most  perfect  co- 
operation, they  draw  ont  the  utmost  from  each, 
and  love  swiftly  repairs  the  wastes.  ITo  man 
connts  expenditm'es  for  ends  that  a  beloved  one 
cherishes,  and  the  loss  which  he  may  suffer  is 
swiftly  transmuted  into  abounding  gain.  A  smile, 
a  loving  look,  it  is  all  forgotten.  A  beam  from  a 
human  eye  has  made  you  richer  tMn  Croesus; 
you  have  seen  that  in  a  hmnan  countenance,  which 
you  literally  would  not  have  bartered  for  the 
wealth  of  worlds. 

Talk  of  the  hardness  of  the  age,  the  deaden- 
ing influence  of  its  commercial  habits  on  the 
noblest  and  most  unselfish  qualities  of  men ! 
Love  laughs  it  all  to  scorn,  and  renews  in  each  - 
generation  the  youth  and  freshness  of  the  world. 
And  love  will  renew  it.  The  world  can  never 
brutalise  itself  w^hile  a  thing  so  spiritual  as  love 
reigns  in  it.  And  love  does  reign.  In  one  shape 
or  other,  with  all  our  grinding  and  driving,  our 
sharp  practices  and  close  bargains,  love  is  the 
mainspring  of  the  world's  movements  still.  A 
stern,  hard,  masterly  man  of  business,  who  had 


16  The  Home  Life. 

realised  an  enormous  fortune,  and  was  supposed 
to  dream  chiefly  of  gold,  died  one  day.  Tliey 
had  to  search  his  strong  chest  to  discover  the  di- 
rections for  the  disposition  of  his  affairs — in  vain, 
till  they  found  a  secret  drawer,  the  innermost 
shrine  of  the  sanctuary.  Here  we  shall  find  the 
will  at  last.  They  forced  it  open,  and  lo  !  a  bunch 
of  faded  flowers,  and  a  lock  of  a  woman's  hair. 
And  love,  noble,  unselfish  love,  moves  more  of  the 
springs  of  your  daily  city  business  firn  any  of 
you  dream.#  And  love  is  simple — ^it  is  one,  what- 
ever be  its  sphere.  Husband,  brother,  child, 
friend ;  there  are  not  many  loves.  It  is  one,  and 
be  the  sphere  closer  or  more  distant,  if  it  be  true, 
it  is  of  kin  with  the  love  of  Gocl. 

"  Husbands  love  your  wives,  even  as  Christ 
also  loved  the  Church,  and  gave  himself  for  it.'''' 
And  what  other  love  was  his  who  moaned,  over 
his  dead  prodigal,  "  O  my  son  Absalom,  my  son, 
my  son  Absalom  !  would  God  I  had  died  for  thee, 
0  Absalom,  my  son,  myson  !  "  And  that  brave 
sister — I  know  such — ^left  an  orphan  in  the  flower 
of  her  girlhood,  with  a  young  brother  of  noble 
promise  in  charge,  cutting  herself  off  deliberately 
from  all  the  pursuits  and  pleasures  which  make 
young  life  so  sweet,  and  shutting  herself  up  to 


They  Two  Shall  le  One,  lY 

constant,  it  may  be  consuming  toil.  Her  face 
tlie  wliile  lias  grown  wan,  her  eyes  have  grown 
dim,  and  her  form  has  become  shrunk  and  with- 
ered in  its  prime  through  this  high  ministry.  But 
she  is  earning  enough  to  send  that  lad  to  college, 
she  keeps  him  there  among  the  best,  and  never 
tells  him  what  it  costs — ^he  will  never  know  it  till 
they  meet  on  high.  She  gives  herself,  her  life,  to 
him ;  and  her  one  reward,  the  rich  repayment  of 
every  toil  and  pain,  is  to  see  him  pass  to  the  front 
rank,  and  lay  his  hand  on  the  chief  prize.  "  Sis- 
ters, love  your  brothers,  even  as  Christ  also  loved 
the  Church."  Love  is  one  wherever  you  find  it, 
and  herein  it  is  heavenly,  its  chief  joy,  its  dear 
delight,  is  ministry  to  the  beloved. 

And  this  is  the  foundation  of  homes.  Souls 
needing  each  other,  drawn  to  each  other,  enter 
into  covenant  with  each  other,  to  share  and 
thereby  bear  lightly  the  burdens,  pains,  and  cares 
of  life. 

The  first  wonderful  thing  that  strikes  us  in 
the  institution  of  the  home,  is  that  the  man  and 
the  woman  who  are  the  head  of  it  are  twain,  yet 
one.  Two  as  the  hemispheres  are  two,  but  one 
in  the  great  circle  of  the  woiid.  Man,  here  on 
cartel  at  any  rate,  is  dual.     The  manly  and  the 


18  The  Home  Life. 

womanly  natures  compose  together  the  perfect 
man,  and  live  together  the  perfect  life.  As  in  the 
world,  so  in  the  home,  God  establishes  at  once 
diversities  and^  contrasts  within  the .  bounds  of  a 
unity.  The  twain  shall  be  one,  shall  belong  to 
each  other,  shall  be  part  of  each  other,  and  yet 
they  shall  be  twain  al-so ;  shall  act  and  react  upon 
each  other,  and  develope  by  their  contrasts  and 
differences  each  other's  Jife.  So  precious  does 
God  hold  this  influence  of  human  spirits  upon 
each  other  to  be,  with  all  the  wisdom,  experience, 
j)atience,  self-control,  and  self-denial,  which  spring 
out  of  it,  that  He  sets  in  a  hopae  a  man  and  a 
woman  in  perpetual  presence  of  each  other,  so 
that  neither  shall  be  without  the  stimulus  to  noble 
and  fruitful  living  which  such  a  presence  cannot 
choose  but  give.  Mutual  forbearance,  mutual 
comfort,  mutual  strength,  mutual  guidance,  mu- 
tual trust;  common  principles,  common  duties, 
common  burdens,  common  aims,  common  hopes, 
common  joys — ^here  are  the  materials  of  life's 
truest,  noblest  discipline ;  here  the  metal  of  char-J^ 
acter  is  welded  and  moulded  into  forms  of  fin- 
ished strength  and  beauty,  meet  for  the  Master's 
work  and  joy  in  the  great  assembly  and  Church 
of  the  first-born  in  heaven. 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  19 

And  the  twain,  the  dual  man,  the  husband 
and  wife,  who  form  the  one  head  of  the  home,  are 
so  constituted  as  to  supplement  each  other.  It  is 
easy  to  contrast  manly  strength  with  womanly 
softness,  gentleness,  and  grace.  But  strength  and 
softness  never  did  miich  by  concert ;  where  this  is 
all,  where  the  higher  idea  of  the  home  relation, 
which  descends  from  heaven,  is  wanting,  man 
hardens  into  the  tyrant,  woman  is  crushed  into 
the  slave.  Strength  has  to  learn  gentleness  and 
gentleness  strength  in  Christ,  before  either  the 
manly  or  the  womanly  perfects  itself,  and  the  two 
can  fully  blend.  Man  is  a  being  of  two  worlds. 
It  is  a  sore  struggle  to  harmonise  their  relations 
and  claims,  and  to  see  that  at  heart  the  two  worlds 
are  one.  It  takes  two  to  do  it  completely;  a 
home  ought  to  hold  fully  the  promise  of  both 
worlds. 

The  business  of  life  has,  without  doubt,  a 
hardening  influence.  The  selfishness,  the  mean- 
ness, the  wickedness,  which  men  have  to  encoun- 
ter in  their  daily  round  of  duties,  the  pure  world- 
liness  which  reigns  in  the  sx3liere  where  much  of 
their  life-task  lies,  tend  terribly  to  mould  round 
the  spirit  a  -thick  shell  of  indifference,  through 
which  the  whispers  of  light  celestial  voices  and 


20  The  Home  Life, 

the  touches  of  light  celestial  fingers  can  find  no 
way.  Tell  me,  busy  men,  is  the  ear  as  keen  as  it 
once  was  to  the  appeals  of  misery  \  is  the  touch 
as  fine  to  the  maimed  and  bruised  ones  who  press 
by  you  in  the  throng,  feeling  feebly  for  the  virtue 
which  once  went  forth  from  you,  and  took  joy  in 
the  ejffort  to  heal  and  to  save  %  Does  life  grow 
larger,  freer,  nobler  daily,  more  full  of  promise, 
more  rich  in  hope?  Or  does  the  wheel  drag 
round  more  wearily,  and  the  spirit  cleave  closer 
to  the  dust  ?  Alas,  yes  I  And  the  sin  and  the 
sorrow  of  it,  women,  lie  mainly  at  your  door. 

Why  has  the  Father  shut  you  within  the 
charmed  circle  into  which  the  toils,  the  hard  ne- 
cessities, the  fierce  storm  of  the  battle  are  forbid- 
den to  pass  ?  Your  husbands  keep  them  outside 
the  citadel  with  strong  arm  and  brave  heart,  but 
ofttimes  sorely  weary  and  sick  of  the  strife.  And 
you  within  ?  Shut  up  with  the  fairest  and  most 
gracious  flowers  that  God  has  planted,  and  the 
angels  tend — -these  little  ones  whose  angels  do 
always  behold  the  face  of  their  Father  which  is 
in  heaven ;  with  a  state  to  rule  which  is  all  within 
easy  touch  of  your  hand ;  with  books,  and  flow- 
ers, and  music,  and  all  lovely  things ;  with  a  heart 
which  God  has  made  intuitive  of  great  truths, 


They  Two  Shall  le  One.  21 

and  capable  of  high  resolves ;  with  a  sense  kept 
fine  and  sensitive  to  all  that  men  get  hardened  to, 
by  the  genial  influences  which  play  around  your 
life.  "Women,  where  is  the  com'age,  the  patience, 
the  constancy,  the  faith,  the  hope,  the  joy,  fed 
ever  from  divine  springs,  which  God  meant  you 
to  store  up  at  home  %  Where  is  that  honey  of 
the  higher  life  which  the  weary  soldiers  may  taste 
and  grow  strong  again,  when  they  come  home 
strained  and  sad  from  their  toils?  At  home! 
At  home  for  a  man,  ought  to  mean,  shut  up  a 
while  with  truth,  purity,  dignity,  goodness,  and 
charity,  zoned  with  a  cestus  of  beauty,  and  dressed 
in  a  lustre  of  love. 

Ah!  it  is  fine  .talking,  many  of  you  will  an- 
swer me.  Brave  words,  and  easy  to  speak,  for 
those  vfho  have  never  •  tried  the  strain  of  a  wo- 
man's life.  Tiresome  children,  careless  servants, 
tattling  neighbours,  and  a  thousand  petty  shocks 
and  frets,  which  try  a  woman's  temper,  and  wear 
her  spirits  far  more  than  the  sterner  strokes  and 
strains  of  the  great  battle  prey  ,upon  the  men ! 
Yes  I  but  then  you  have  laid  down  yom-  sceptre, 
you  have  descended  from  yom-  throne,  you  have 
forgotten  your  spells.  A  gracious  woman  has 
no  tiresome  children,  thriftless  servants,  tattling 


22  The  Home  Life, 

friends.     Look  upon  lier  portraiture,  painted  by 
a  great  master's  liand : 

"  Who  can  find  a  mrtuous  woman  f  for  her 
jprice  is  far  above  rubies.  The  heart  of  her  hus- 
hancl  doth  safely  trust  in  her^  so  that  he  shall  have 
no  need  of  sj)oll.  She  will  do  him  good  and  not 
evil  all  the  days  of  her  life.  She  seeketh  wool^ 
and  flax^  and  worlceth  willingly  with  her  hands. 
She  is  like  the  merchants  ships  /  she  bring eth  her 
food  from  afar.  She  riseth  also  while  it  is  yet 
nighty  and  giveth  meat  to  her  household^  and  a 
portion  to  her  maidens.  She  considereth  a  field, 
and  huyeth  it :  with  the  fruit  of  her  hands  she 
planteth  a  vineyard.  She  girdeth  her  loins  loith 
strength.,  and  strengtheneth  her  arms.  She  per- 
ceiveth  that  her  merchandise  is  good :  her  candle 
goeth  not  out  by  night.  She  layeth  her  hands  to 
the  spindle,  and  her  hands  hold  the  distaff.  She 
strctcheth  out  Jier  hand  to  the  poor  ;  yea,  she  reacJi- 
eth  forth  her  hand  to  the  needy.  She  is  not  afraid 
of  the  snow  for  her  household :  for  all  her  house- 
hold are  clothed  with  scarlet.  She  maketJi  herself 
coverings  of  tapesti^y  j  her  clothing  is  silk  and 
purple.  Her  husband  is  known  in  the  gates, 
when  he  sitteth  among  the  elders  of  the  land.  Sh^ 
malceth  fine  linen,  and  selleth  it;  and  delivereth 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  23 

girdles  unto  the  merchant.  Strength  and  honour 
are  her  clothing  /  and  she  shall  rejoice  in  time  to 
come.  She  openeth  her  mouth  with  wisdom  /  and 
in  her  tongioe  is  the  law  of  Mndness.  She  loolceth 
well  to  the  ways  of  her  household^  and  eateth  not 
the  hread  of  idleness.  Her  children  arise  up^  and 
call  her  Messed  j  her  husband  also^  and  he prais- 
eth  her.  Many  daughters  have  done  virtuously^ 
hut  thou  excellest  them  all.  Favour  is  deceitful^ 
and  heauty  is  v-ain  j  hut  «  woman  that  feareth  the 
Lord  she  shall  he  jpraised.  Give  her  thefricit  of 
her  hands  /  and  let  her  own  worJcs  ])raise  her  in 
the  gatesP     (Prov.  xxxi.  10-31.) 

Such  women  have  learnt  the  spell  to  which 
the  idle  ront  of  frets  and  cares  cringe  down,  as 
the  waves  knew  their  Master's  presence,  and 
smoothed  their  foamy  crests  w^hen  he  arose.  I 
know  women  whose  hearts  are  an  unfailing  foun- 
tain of  courage  and  inspiration  to  the  hard-pressed 
man,  who  but  for  them  must  be  worsted  in  life's 
battle ;  whose  pure  loftiness  of  spirit,  caught  from 
contact  with  the  Highest,  breathes  calm  rebuke 
on  the  beggarly  aims  and  hopes,  which  seem  so 
large  when  we  are  down  upon  the  level,  so  poor 
when  we  are  up  upon  the  height ;  whose  sweet 
serenity,  like  a  cool  hand,  purges  the  heat  of  an- 


24  The  Home  Life. 

ger  and  passion ;  whose  stores  of  tliought,  feeling, 
and  observation,  spread  forth  with  happy  art, 
make  home  a  treasury  of  pure  and  elevating 
pleasures;  whose  sympathy  is  strength  to  the 
weary,  and  guidance  to  the  perplexed ;  and  who 
send  fbrth  husband  or  brother  each  morning  with 
new  strength  for  his  conflict,  armed,  as  the  lady 
armed  her  knight  of  old,  with  a  shield  which  he 
may  not  stain  in  any  unseemly  conflicts,  and  a 
sword  which  he  dares  only  use  against  the  ene- 
mies of  truth,  righteousness,  and  God. 

I  know  such  women,  and,  blessed  be  God,  I 
have  not  far  to  seek  them ;  but  it  seems  sometimes 
as  if  they  were  becoming  fewer.  They  could  not 
have  been  rare  in  Shakespeare's  day,  in  Spenser's 
day,  in  Chaucer's  day.  There  were  many  of 
them  in  the  company  which  gathered  around  the 
Lord.  But  where  are  they  now  ?  Women,  gather 
again  around  the  springs  whence  the  holy  women 
of  old  di-ew  their  inspirations.  Live  much  with 
God,  that  your  prayers  may  strengthen  your  hus- 
bands to  bear  them  manlike  in  the  battle,  and 
that  you  may  have  some  bread  which  is  nutritive 
of  manly  vigour,  when,  weary  with  the  struggle, 
they  come  home  to  you  to  rest.  You  live  in  a 
charmed  circle  guarded  carefully  from  the  shocks 


They  Two  Shall  he  One.  25 

wliicli  bruise  tlie  limbs  and  organs  of  the  bigher 
life  in  tbose  wlio  go  down  to  the  contentions  of 
the  world.  Fill  that  circle  with  something  that 
men  may  honour  and  cherish,  the  more  dearly 
b'ecaiise  they  meet  it  so  rarely  in  the  scenes  where 
they  ply  their  tasks.  Set  fairly  before  their  sight 
the  noblest,  purest,  most  lovely  thing  that  God 
looks  upon  in  all  His  worlds — a  woman  of  gra- 
cious, serene,  liberal,  and  chastened  spirit.  Let 
the  fountain  of  living  waters  be  ever  gushing  for 
the  refreshing  of  the  weary  pilgrims  of  the  house- 
hold, where  God  has  trained  them  by  sure  instinct 
to  look  for  it — the  mother's  heart. 

I  say  nothing  here  of  woman's  rights.  I  have 
not  the  patience  to  do  it.  Battling  for  idle  rights, 
while  she  lets  such  glorious  power  slip  all  unused 
out  of  her  hand !  Wonderful  is  the  power  of  wo- 
man to  rule  the  world,  to  do  what  she  will  with 
it,  if  she  but  cares  to  wield  it.  But  the  one 
spring  of  her  power  is  the  spring  of  the  divine 
power,  and  of  the  power  that  lies  in  all  nobleness 
and  goodness,  the  power  to  love,  to  serve,  to  save. 
Seize  it  once  more,  and  the  world  is  at  your  feet. 

Thus  far  I  have  spoken  almost  exclusively  of 
the  women,  for  the  home  is  their  realm.  But 
what  of  the  men  ?  I  think  that  the  best  home- 
2 


26  The  Home  Life, 

work  whicli  they  can  do  is  to  lielp  the  women,  by 
patience,  tenderness,  and  clieerfulness,  to  realize 
their  idea.  There  is  a  certain  monotony  in  the 
household  cares,  of  which  the  men,  whose  work 
calls  them  abroad,  shoiild  never  be  unmindful ; 
the  joyful  break  in  that  monotony  should  be  their 
entrance  into  the  home,  which  needs  their  pres- 
ence to  crown  its  life.  Busy,  energetic  men  are 
sadly  tempted  to  think  of  the  high-minded  wo- 
men who  have  a  vision  of  what  the  home-life 
might  be,  as  dreamers ;  and  to  treat  their  vivid 
sense  of  the  spiritual  as  a  graceful,  womanly 
weakness,  with  which  they  have  no  need  to  con- 
cern themselves,  their  life  lying  in  a  quite  differ- 
ent sphere.  It  is  this  division  of  the  spheres 
which  is  so  detrimental,  so  fatal.  Communion  of 
\  interest,  belief,  pursuit,  is  the  very  life-blood  of 
[the  home.  Unless  the  husband  has  the  grace  to 
honour  in  his  heart  the  ideal  which  his  wife  is 
aiming  at,  to  watch  her  endeavour  with  tender 
reverence,  and  lend  a  brave  hand  to  carry  it  up 
to  success,  the  home  will  lose  its  sunlight,  the 
children  their  noblest  nurture,  and  life  its  most 
golden  fruits. 

And  say  not,  I  pray  you,  that  this  is  pure 
idealism,  and  that  human  homes  in  such  a  world 


They  Two  Shqll  he  One.  27 

as  this  must  pitch,  their  music  in  a  far  lower  and 
more  practicable  key.  I  know  such  women;  I 
know  such  homes ;  and  God  sees  myriads  of  them ; 
they  are  the  salt  of  the  earth,  and  its  light.  Wo- 
men, you  must  multiply  them,  if  sbciety  is  to  be 
saved.  And  if  ideals  are  bootless,  and  only  daunt 
and  dispirit  us,  why  has  God  set  before  us,  clear 
within  our  horizon,  such  a  life  as  the  life  of  His 
well-beloved  Son?  Thank  God  that  you  have 
such  ideals  above  you  far'up  in  the  height,  which 
are  ever  drawing  you  by  their  sweet  magnetic 
spells  out  of  the  slough  in  which  the  devil  of 
worldliness  and  selfishness  is  seeking  to  drown 
you,  burying  there  what  dignity,  purity,  and  510- 
bleness  are  still  left  us*  in  the  world,  to  lift  our  life 
up  above  the  brutes.  Honour  these  lofty  forms 
of  things  in  your  heart  of  hearts,  aim  at  them  in 
your  life  of  lives.  Lend  dignity  thus  to  every 
effort  to  rule  passion,  to  curb  self-will,  to  master 
the  body,  to  conquer  the  world,  to  cheer  and 
gladden  the  home  with  the  light  which  God  kin- 
dles in  the  heart  which  can  be  satisfied  supremely 
only  by  His  love.  And  then,  as  the  years  roll  on, 
and  the  family  widens,  and  some,  not  the  least  be- 
loved, leave  it,  to  prepare  a  welcome  for  the  tired 
pilgrims    to    the    eternal    mansions    where    the 


28  The  Home  Life. 

"  wliole  family "  will  be  gathered  at  last,  see  to 
it  that  day  by  day,  by  patient,  constant,  God- 
directed  efforts,  your  surroundings  in  the  house 
which  God  has  built  to  shelter  you,  grow  more 
into  the  likeiiess  which  heaven  as  well  as  earth 
shall  recognise  as  "  a  home." 


n. 

THESE  LITTLE  0OT:S. 

"  Talce  Jieed  that  ye  despise  not  one  of  these  little  ones.'''* 
■^Matt.  xviii.  10. 

Earth  lias  no  monopoly  of  the  experiences  of 
"  home."  It  is  a  divine  image,  having  its  arche- 
type on  high,  which  is  reproduced  in  whatever  is 
purest  and  brightest  in  the  home  life  of  mankind. 
There  was  the  divine  home  before  there  was  the 
-  human.  The  Father  knew  His  child  and  blessed' 
him. ;  yea,  He  foreknew  all  the  pain,  the  anguish, 
the  joy,  which  would  spring  from  him,  before  He 
sent  him  forth  to  found  his  home,  and  learn  out 
of  his  own  home-experience  the  secret  of  his  rela- 
tions and  duties  to  his  God.  We  have  seen  al- 
ready that  the  broad  fact  of  the  human  home  is 
duality  with  unity.  One  flesh,  yet  twain.  One 
^^    human   being,  yet  two   human   souls,  acting  on 


30  Tlie  Home  Life. 

ing,  and  educating  eacli  other,  and  yet  the  one 
head  of  a  household ;  the  manly  and  the  womanly 
natures  blending  in  the  one  mind  which  is  to  rule, 
and  the  one  spirit  which  is  to  animate  and  conse- 
crate the  whole.  "  Therefore  shall  a  man  leave 
his  father  and  his  mother,  and  shall  cleave  unto 
his  wife  /  and  they  two  shall  he  one  fleshy  Here 
is  unity  with  duality ;  and  this  in  every  region  is 
the  condition  of  all  the  higlier  developments  of 
life.  I  say  that  the  idea  descended  from  on  high. 
The  last,  the  perfect,  human  estate  shall  likewise 
come  down  from  God  out  of  heaven.  "  And  I 
John  saw  the  holy  city,  new  Jerusalem,  coining 
down  from  God  out  of  heaven,  prepared  as  a 
hride  adorned  for  her  husband.  And  I  heard  a 
great  voice  out  of  heaven  saying,  Behold,  the  tdb- 
lernacle  of  God  is  with  menP  The  first  human 
estate  descended  from  the  same  height,  and  took 
its  place  by  the  same  right  as  a  heaven-born  thing 
in  this  lower  world.  It  was  not  good  that  man 
should  be  alone,  for  a  hundred  reasons,  but  mainly 
for  one — God  would  not  be  alone.  What  is  the 
history  of  this  earth  of  ours  but  the  history  of  the 
desire  and  effort  of  God  to  blend  Himself  with 
humanity — God  in  Christ  seeking  the  world  as 
His  bride,  and  filling  His  home  with  the  recov- 


TJiese  Little  Ones.  31 

ered,  the  twice-born  sons.  There  is  that  in  God 
which  moves  Him  to  seek  this  fellowship  with 
free  beings  formed  in  His  likeness.  "We  recog- 
nise reverently  the  Divine  Sovereignty,  bnt  it  is 
only  another  name  for  the  action  whose  springs 
lie  deeply  enfolded  within  His  own  being.  When 
He  passed  by  the  nature  of  angels  and  took  on 
Him  the  seed  of  Abraham,  that  sovereign  act 
was  a  full  manifestation  of  Himself.  From  the 
beginning,  in  the  elder  eternity,  or  ever  time  was, 
His  Word  ranged  forward  in  thought  and  hope  to 
the  creation,  and  His  joys  were  then  by  foretaste 
with  His  sons.  In  the  hour  of  the  transgression 
He  joined  Himself  to  humanity ;  and  He  became 
in  Eden,  ere  He  drove  forth  the  man,  the  Father 
and  the  Founder  of  the  first  human  home.  Suf- 
fer me  again  to  warn  you  against  treating  these 
images  as  vague  poetic  expressions,  whose  literal 
truth  is  not  to  be  pressed  too  rigidly  home.  Po- 
etry, if  it  is  worth  anything,  is  the  speech  of  that 
real  world  which  is  behind  the  shadows ;  and  on 
divine  lips,  at  any  rate,  the  words  may  bear  their 
uttermost  meaning  to  our  hearts.  These  are  not 
terms  borrowed  from  relations  and  affinities  with 
w^hich  man  is  familiar,  to  help  him  to  conceive  of 
the  reality  of  those  which  are  beyond  the  range 


32  The  Home  Life. 

of  his  sifijlit.  I  ao-ain  insist  that  it  is  the  human 
relation  and  affinity  which  is  borrowed.  We  do 
not  borrow  the  word  "  Father,"  and  apply  it  to 
the  setting  forth  of  something  which  transcends 
description  and  definition  in  God.  Were  that  the 
truth  of  the  matter,  the  Chinese  should  be  our 
chief  teachers  about  the  Divine  Fatherhood ;  but 
they  have  never  been  able  to  take  the  step  from 
the  idolatry  of  the  human  father  to  the  worship 
of  the  divine.  E'o ;  God  lends  to  us,  and  but 
takes  His  own  again  when  He  bids  us  pray, 
"  Our  Father^  which  art  in  heaven^  Hallowed  he 
thy  name P 

You  may  call  this  theology  transcendental,  or 
what  you  will,  but  it  is  the  simple  truth  of  the 
matter.  There  is  no  relation  which  man  sustains, 
no  duty  which  he  is  called  to  fulfil,  no  burden 
which  he  is  made  to  bear,  no  joy,  no  sorrow, 
which  it  is  given  to  him  to  taste,  the  original  image 
of  which  is  not  to  be  found  in  God,  and  in  God's 
relations  to  the  world.  We  interpret  altogether 
too  feebly  the  sentence,  "  God  made  man  in  his 
own  imageP  We  let  om*  reverence  become  sla- 
vish, and  cramp  our  freedom.  God  has  come 
forth  to  unfold  to  us  the  principle  of  all  the  du- 
ties, affinities,  relations,  and  experiences  of  our 


» 


These  Little  Ones.  33 

race,  in  His  own  life.     "  Thfy  maker  is  thine  hios- 

hand  /  the  Lord  of  hosts  is  His  name The 

Lord  hath  called  thee  as  a  loo^nan  forsaken  and 
grieved  in  spirit,  and  a  wife  of  youth,  when  thou 
wast  refused,  saith  thy  GodP  "  Ls  JEjphraim  my 
dear  son  f  is  he  a  pleasant  child  f  for  since  1 
sjpake  against  him,  L  do  earnestly  rememler  him 
still ;  therefore  my  bowels  are  troubled  for  him  :  1 
will  surely  have  mercy  upon  him,  saith  the  LordP 
Tliis  is  the  key-note  of  God's  most  earnest  and 
tender  appeals  to  His  people.  Husband,  father, 
child.  He  knows  the  truth  of  these  human  rela- 
tions/>'C>m  within. 

In  the  home  man  developes  into  the  triad,  and 
all  the  higher  interest  of  life  begins.  This  also 
has  its  original  in  God.  A  lonely  eternity  could 
not  satisfy  Him ;  He  can  be  satisfied  only  in  what 
is  born,  not  out  of  His  hand  of  power,  but  out  of 
His  heart  of  love.  To  dwell  with  beings  after 
His  likeness,  able  to  respond  to  His  spirit,  as  man 
moves  responsive  to  man,  able  to  dwell  with  Him 
in  His  eternal  home,  and  to  make  it  bright  with 
the  presence  of  His  sons  for  ever,  this  is  His  idea 
of  life.  "When  the  sons  were  born  into  His  home, 
the  life  of  God  was  manifest.  The  living  Being 
came  forth  to  walk  and  talk  in  Eden  with  His 
2* 


34  The  Home  Life. 

children,  wliile  the  rosy  dawn  lay  soft  and  bright 
on  the  young  beauty  of  creation,  and  the  music 
of  tlie  morning  stars  streamed  down  upon  the 
throbbing  air,  and  fell  like  a  dew  of  benediction, 
"  Behold^  it  is  very  goodP  But  the  fulness  of 
God,  the  fulness  of  His  thought,  desire,  and  life, 
was  yet  unrevealed.  There  was  that  within  the 
bosom  of  the  divine  nature  which  creation  could 
neither  express  nor  satisfy.  All  its  floods  of  liv- 
ing splendour,  all  its  jubilant  bursts  of  harmony, 
had  left,  if  creation  could  have  rested  there,  some- 
thing ever  unsatisfied  in  the  divine  heart.  The 
children  must  win  an  experience,  and  live  a  life, 
which  would  set  them  where  creation  could  never 
enter — in  the  inner  sanctuary  of  His  love.  The 
Adam  of  Eden  did  not  meet  that  longing — the 
Adam  of  heaven  had  to  be  born.  And  the  sec- 
ond, the  heavenly  man,  is  born,  not  of  the  will 
of  God,  not  of  EQs  power,  but  of  a  love  which 
could  bear  joyfully  such  pains  of  death  as  no  crea- 
ture knoweth,  if  it  might  but  reclaim  the  wander- 
ers, and  restore  the  sons  twice-born  to  the  Father's 
home  and  heart. 

And  the  idea  works  itself  out  in  the  sphere 
of  the  human.  He  who  was  made  in  the  image 
of  God  has  the  image  also  of  this.     As  Adam 


These  Little  Ones.  35 

was  born  into  God's  home,  these  little  ones  are 
born  into  yours.  The  life  and  development  of 
the  child  who  was  born  1:0  Him  became  the  su- 
preme interest  with  God,  and  of  all  in  heaven 
that  is  in  communion  with  the  life  of  God.  A 
new  and  richer  development  of  the  life  of  the 
great  universe  began  from  that  hour,  when  the 
Lord  looked  upon  the^man  whom  He  had  made 
in  His  likeness,  and  sent  him  forth  to  his  high 
career.  And  thus  all  the  nobler  interest  of  yonr 
life  as  men  begins,  when  God  puts  one  of  these 
little  ones  into  your  arms.  Its  helpless  eyes  and 
hands  can  reach  the  inner  springs  of  your  being. 
They  can  compel  you,  strong  man,  all  helpless  as 
they  are,  to  gird  yom'self  for  a  toil  which  is  your 
sweetest  rest,  if  these  little  ones  are  fed  by  it, — 
if  they  grow  fair  and  strong,  and  rain  the  sun- 
light of  their  joyous  tones  and  glances  on  your 
home  as  your  rich  reward.  Many  a  hard  line 
which  the  world  has  traced,  and  many  a  stain 
of  the  dust  and  sweat  of  its  battle  which  your 
day's  cares  and  toils  have  left  upon  your  spirit, 
gets  wiped  away  ere  nightfall  by  a  tiny  hand. 
All  is  made  soft  and  bright  again  as  the  little 
ones  gather  around  your  knee  by  the  home  fire- 


36  The  Home  Life. 

side.     These  little  ones !     Take  heed  that  ye  de- 
spise them  not. 

Little  children ;  not  angels,  even  in  the  bud, 
and  never  to  be  angels.  God  made  the  rudiment 
of  something  much  greater  than  an  angel  when 
He  made  a  child.  It  is  idle  to  talk  about  the 
angelic  beauty,  purity,  and  grace  of  childhood, 
and  to  maunder  about  them  as  if  it  were  wholly 
due  to  their  parents'  sin  if  they  do  not  remain 
angels  through  life  and  through  eternity.  They 
were  born  through  Adam,  as  Adam  was  bom,  to 
sin,  to  sulier,  and  to  be  redeemed.  The  seeds  of 
it  all  lie  enfolded  there  within  that  soft  nest  of 
flesh,  which  is  altogether  the  most  rare,  the  most 
wonderful,  the  most  exquisite,  of  all  the  mere 
handiwork  of  God.  The  parent  who  does  not 
understand  that  these  little  ones  are  born  for  a 
sad  and  stern  experience,  is  likely  to  do  his  best 
to  hand  them  over,  bound  and  helpless,  into  the 
destroyer's  hand.  The  motions  of  sins  will  be  at 
work  in  them  with  the  first  motions  of  freedom 
and  buddings  of  life;  and  Christ,  '-'the  Light 
whic\  coming  into  the  world^  lighteth  every  man^'^ 
every,  child,  alone  can  stand  between  them  and  a 
future,  at  the  vision  of  which,  but  for  Christ  and 
His  redemption  of  these  little  ones,  the  heart  of  a 


Tliese  Little  Ones.  3Y 

parent  miglit  well  shudder  and  fall  as  dead.  Do 
not  mistake  tliem,  then,  for  angels*,  needing  but 
freedom  to  soar  in  empyrean  regions.  They  are 
men  and  women,  whose  life  here  must  be  a  stern 
and  long  struggle  with  sin,  and  who  must  learn 
to  suffer  and  to  conquer  before  they  can  soar, 
whom  God  puts  into  your  arms  in  the  soft  bud 
of  their  being ;  and  He  prays  you  to  use  wise  fa- 
therly and  motherly  discipline  with  them  from 
the  first,  as  He  uses  it  with  you.  "We  talk  some- 
times yery  foolishly  about  the  perfectness  of  Adam 
in  Eden.  It  was  but  an  infirm  and  partial  per- 
fectness. At  the  first  touch  of  the  tempter,  it 
collapsed  and  crumbled  into  dust.  Of  like  sub- 
stance is  the  perfectness  of  these  little  ones, — a 
perfect  image,  a  fair  promise,  a  bright  prophecy, 
the  fulfilling  of  which  lies  beyond  this  sin-haunted 
wilderness  and  the  river  of  death. 

These  little  ones !  ^ot  angels,  then ;  on  the 
other  hand,  not  children  of  the  devil,  but  nurslings 
of  Christ.  "  Take  it,  and  bring  it  up  for  Me." 
I  have  no  call  to  enter  here  into  curious  doctrinal 
discussions  as  to  the  natural  estate  of  young  chil- 
dren. Blessed  be  God,  their  estate  in  Christ  has 
become  a  spiritual  estate,  and  all  their  destiny  has 
passed  under  the  rule  of  His  redeeming  love.    We 


38  The  Home  Life, 

have  bui-ied  for  ever,  let  us  hope,  that  terrible 
sentence  of  a  .pitiless  Calvinism,  "  There  are  in- 
fants a  span  long  in  hell."  I  have  heard  the  sen- 
tence from  the  lips  of  divines,  and  have  shud- 
dered as  I  heard.  DeviKsh  it  seems  to  me,  for  it 
makes  God  malignant  as  a  devil.  I  humbly  hope 
that  no  threats,  no  tortures,  could  make  me  bow 
my  knee  to  such  a  god.  I  turn  from  him  to  the 
God-man,  who  gathered  the  infants  round  Him, 
and  took  them  in  Ilis  arms,  and  blessed  them,  and 
said,  "  Suffer  the  litUe  children  to  come  unto  me^ 
and  forbid  them  not  /  for  of  such  is  the  kingdom 
of  heaven.^^  Gladder  was  He,  perhaps,  at  that 
moment,  as  the  little  ones  clustered  round  His 
knee  and  pressed  to  His  heart,  than, through  His 
whole  pilgrimage  of  sorrows.  As  the  pure  fresh 
morning  air,  in  which  the  rosy  flush  is  glowing, 
and  on  which  the  meadows  have  flung  their  dewy 
sweets,  must  the  balmy  breath  of  these  little  ones 
have  played  on  the  Saviour's  strained  and  weary 
heart.  Unselfish,  unworldly,  uncareful,  unfearful, 
unenvious,  ungrasping,  unconscious,  innocent! 
What  a  garden  of  flowers  is  here,  with  the  morn- 
ing light  playing  upon  it,  and  the  air  alive  with 
song !  Take  heed  that  ye  despise  it  not.  It  is 
the  garden  where,  in  the  early  light,  you  may 


These  Little  Ones.  39 

meet  the  Master :  He  is  abroad  in  it  betimes,  and 
here  you  may  learn  His  deepest  thoughts,  and 
hear  His  wisest  and  most  lovely  words  v"-^a?c^i?^ 
ye  he  converted^  and  heeome  as  little  children^  ye 
cannot  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  lieavenP 

Little  children.  The  whole  force  of  the  words 
is  here.  They  soon  learn  the  battle-cries  of  our 
conflicts,  and  shape  their  puppets  after  the  like- 
ness of  our  follies  and  sins.  But  little  children 
are  Christ's  own  nurslings.  They  love,  and  trust, 
and  give,  after  the  fashion  that  reigns  in  heaven. 
Love  is  their  sunlight ;  they  ask  for  nothing  but 
to  bask  in  it.  There  is  no  glow  for  them  when 
that  sun  in  the  home  is  clouded;  there  are  no 
clouds  for  them  when  that  sun  in  the  home  is  un- 
veiled. They  have  no  possessions  which  they  do 
not  increase  by  sharing.  Give  a  little  one  the 
gift  it  longs  for,  and  straightway  it  toddles  off  in 
its  glee  to  share  it  with  its  friend.  Their  only 
idea  of  having  is  sharing,  till  you  have  taught 
them  a  darker  lesson.  The  very  birds  trust  not 
more  joyously  the  bountiful  hand  of  the  Father 
which  is  over  them  all.  "]^ever  mind,"  said  a 
little  one  once  to  a  father  who  had  his  full  share 
of  the  burdens  and  struggles  of  life,  and  who  was 
lamenting  to  her  that  he  was  too  poor  to  gratify 


40  The  Home  Life. 

some  desire  whicli  slie  liad  expressed — "never 
mind,  papa,  jou  have  enough  to  go  on  with." 
Yes,  I  thought,  when  I  heard  it,  "  Out  of  the 
mouth  of  tabes  and  suchlings  Thou  hast  ordained 
strength^  and  perfected  •j^raiseP 

A  whole  Sermon  on  the  Momit  is  enfolded 
there  in  the  bud  of  their  young  natures.  It 
seems  to  us  ideal  truth.  "We  read  these  wonder- 
ful words  of  Christ  as  though  they  might  come 
to  be  living  words  to  us  in  some  far-olT  heavenly- 
state.  Look  down  at  your  feet ;  these  little  ones 
are  living  it.  They  give  not  their  alms  before 
men  to  be  seen  of  them ;  and  till  you  have  taught 
them,  they  use  no  vain  repetitions  in  their  prayers. 
They  are  imskilled  as  yet  to  pray  for  their  ene- 
mies ;  and  they  pray  with  a  beautiful  trust  and 
tenderness  for  tljeir  friends.  The  poor,  the  hun- 
gry, open  wide  at  once  their  fountains  of  com- 
passion. The  last  mite  goes  as  frankly  as  the 
first,  if  the  Lord  has  need  of  it.  They  nestle 
closer  to  the  meek,  the  merciful,  the  poor  in  spirit, 
yea,  the  persecuted  for  righteousness'  sake,  than 
to  priests  or  princes.  A  little  one  would  be  more 
at  home  at  the  gate  with  Lazarus,  than  feasting 
with  Dives  at  his  groaning  board.  The  only 
patent  of  precedence  you  can  get  them  to  recog- 


These  Little  Ones.  41 

nise  is  the  mark  of  goodness,  gentleness,  and  no- 
bleness, wliich  God's  elect  ones  bear,  and  wliicli 
none  see  so  swiftly  as  a  child.  They  know  noth- 
ing of  the  lore  of  curses  and  anathemas ;  coat  and 
cloak  may  go  as  they  will,  so  that  inner  and  di- 
viner things  are  left.  They  know  not  to  frame 
hard  judgments ;  they  aim  not  at  a  double  ser- 
vice ;  they  love  to  build  on  the  firm  rock  of  com- 
mandment; the  sands  of  interest,  ambition,  and 
worldly  honom^  are  too  treacherous  for  their 
trembling  steps ;  they  consider  the  birds  and  the 
lilies  with  a  joy  and  a  wonder  which  no  hard 
science  has  robbed  of  its  enchantment ;  and  they 
take  their  daily  bread  as  trustfully  and  thank- 
fully from  the  same  ever-bountiful  and  merciful 
hand.  Take  heed  that  ye  offend  not  one  of  these 
little  ones.  Take  heed.  Offend  them,  and  the 
Master  saith,  "  it  were  better  that  a  millstone  were 
hanged  about  your  neck^  and  you  were  disowned 
in  the  depths  of  the  seaP 

And  God  trusts  them  to  us — these  little  ones 
— ^flowers  of  such  grace  and  beauty  as  grow  not 
in  the  plains  of  heaven.  His  nurslings  they  are, 
— the  dearest  objects  of  His  care  and  love.  He 
has  nothing  in  the  universe  so  precious,  so  rich  in 
promise,  as  a  little  child;   and  this  is  the  gift 


42  The  Home  Life, 

wliicli  He  takes,  and  trustfully  places  in  our 
liands.  There  is  sometliing  quite  awful,  when 
we  attempt  to  measure  it,  in  the  trust  which  God 
has  reposed,  and  still  reposes,  in  a  being  so  hard, 
so  selfish,  so  faithless  as  man.  These  little  ones 
are  God's  little  ones.  They  are  His  chief  treas- 
ures.: they  are  to  people  heaven  or  hell.  The 
future  of  the  universe,  the  fruit  of  Calvary,  the 
triumph  of  His  kingdom,  hang  absolutely  on  their 
future.  They  are  to  fill  up  the  number  of  His 
first-born,  and  crowd  the  general  assembly  and 
Church  on  high;  or  the  devil  is  to  drag  them 
into  his  accursed  dominions,  to  fill  the  home  with 
wailing,  and  Hades  with  death.  The  fiends  are 
watching  this  garden  of  Christ;  the  angels  are 
tending  it.  But  the  chief  keeper  and  captain  of 
these  little  ones  is  man. 

And  where  is  the  home  where  these  little  ones 
are  nurtured  up  to  the  idea  of  "  the  nurture  of  the 
Lord  "  %  There  are  a  myriad  human  homes  where 
they  are  nursed  on  the  bread  of  selfishness  and 
the  milk  of  passion,  where  the  air  is  laden  with 
blasphemies,  obscenities,  or  with  a  worse  burden, 
the  blight  of  an  utterly  worldly  and  selfish  pa- 
rental heart;  where  every  fair  young  bud  that 
might  fruit  in  heaven  is  nipped  and  blasted,  and 


These  Little  Ones.  43 

foul  weeds  are  forced  into  proud  luxuriance, 
which  will  fruit  in  hell;  where  envy,  hatred, 
malice,  and  all  uncharitableness,  form  the  at- 
mosphere which  enfolds  the  nurslings ;  Vv^here  life 
grows  weary  and  hateful  early;  where  innocent 
hearts  get  charged  with  evil,  and  noble  passions 
get  poisoned  with  selfishness,  and  comely  sjioots 
get  twisted  into  ugliness,  and  God's  broad  seal  of 
beauty  is  obliterated,  and  the  stamp  of  the  evil 
one  is  branded  in  its  room.  Yes,  there  are  a 
myriad  such  homes  where  man  is  doing  the  devil's 
work  for  God's  little  ones,  to  one  where  they  are 
trained  to  a  noble  and  comely  manhood  and  wo- 
manhood, and  are  sent  forth  to  their  battle,  since 
fight  they  must,  as  the  knight  was  sent  forth  of 
old  when  his  lady  had  braced  on  his  armour,  with 
a  talisman  which  shielded  him  from  all  impurity, 
and  a  strength  which  made  him  master  of  every 
foe.  And  yet  God  trusts  them — trust,  trust, 
always  trust.  Yerily,  "  God  loveth  the  world." 
He  gave  His  Son,  He  is  giving  His  infants  daily 
into  its  charge,  in  tender  pity,  in  pure  compassion. 
He  knows  that  if  He  were  to  withhold  them,  if 
He  were  to  gather  unto  Himself  in  anger,  the 
flowers  which  we  are  ever  soiling  and  crushing, 
the  world,  bare  of  its  little  ones — ^those  rills  of 


44:  The  Home  Life. 

liealing,  purifying  waters  wliicli  are  gushing  and 
trickling  everywhere  about  its  sin-parched  plains 
— would  go  down  full  swiftly  to  the  pit.  It  is  an 
awful  trust,  could  we  truly  measure  it,  this  trust 
of  God  to  His  rebel.  "  Thou  hast  wronged  and 
wounded  me,  and  behold  I  give  thee  these ;  take 
heed,  that  thou  despise  them  not."  The  reason 
of  this  trust  we  are  permitted  to  look  into.  Some 
hints  of  it  we  will  endeavour  to  set  forth. 

I.  These  little  ones  are  sent  to  us  to  make 
us  free  of  the  art  and  mystery  of  love,  that  we 
may  learn  through  the  love  of  man  something 
of  the  love  of  God.  "  Love  is  or  God,  for  God 
IS  LOVE."  And  love  is  one.  All  love  that  is  not 
self-love  has  God  for  its  fountain,  and  Christ  for 
its  pattern.  It  is  its  essential  nature  to  give 
itself  to  and  for  its  object.  Communion  is  its 
passion,  sacrifice  is  its  life.  A  man  is  rich  and 
blessed  precisely  in  the  measure  in  which  he  lives 
in  its  current.  Hell  is,  where  life  is  stagnant  and 
love  is  dead.  Wretched  and  unmanlike  they, 
who  have  never  found  that  which  is  dearer  than 
life,  and  for  the  love  of  which  they  will  gladly 
die.  IS'ay,  the  brutes  teach  them  a  nobler  lesson, 
as  was  written  over  Gelert's  grave.     This  is  the 


These  Little  Ones.  45 

ray  of  the  lieayenlj  glory  that  once  crowned  the 
fether  of  our  race,  wfiich  hngers  longest ;  and  it 
shines  oftentimes  with  softest,  fairest  lustre  in  the 
most  wretched,  yea,  even  the  most  profligate  and 
abandoned  hearts.  Among  the  outcasts,  the  men 
and  women  who  are  stained  with  every  crime 
and  lust,  it  is  the  last  glow  of  the  pristine  glory 
which  lingers,  and  sometimes  it  flashes  with  in- 
tense brightness  out  of  the  very  depths.  The  Sav- 
iour found  its  purest  fire  in  a  poor  harlot's  heart. 
Heaven  does  not  give  up  its  reprobates  as  readily 
as  earth  does.  It  holds  to  them,  as  the  Lord  held 
to  that  poor  woman  who  was  a  sinner,  while  one 
pulse  can  throb  to  the  touch  or  thrill  to  the  voice 
of  love. 

And  God  has  made  it  the  bond  of  homes. 
He  wiU  make  it  the  bond  of  kingdoms  and  of 
worlds.  He  lays  these  little  ones  in  our  bosom, 
that  we  may  learn  the  lore  of  love  through  ten- 
der teachers,  and  be  drawn  out  by  mute  but  sov- 
ereign appeals  to  know  all  its  toils,  its  pains,  and 
its  bliss.  The  measure  in  which  we  know  them 
is  the  measure  of  our  being;  a  man's  being  is 
just  as  wide  as  his  love.  And  what  trinity,  save 
One,  knows  the  mystery  so  deeply?  Husband, 
wife,  child,  learning  daily  fresh  lessons,  to  train 


46  The  Home  Life, 

them  for  the  love  of  a  wider  family,  and  the  great 
Father,  God.  Perhaps  love  is  purest  and  freshest 
in  the  heart  of  a  parent,  most  strong  to  toil,  most 
prompt  to  sacrifice,  most  set  on  another's  good. 
Strong,  stem  men,  whom  the  world  could  not 
bend  from  their  purpose,  maj  be  led  by  the  touch 
of  a  tiny  finger;  1:here  are  those  at  home  who 
can  turn  them  by  a  silken  cord  whither  they  will. 
Thus  the  home  which  is  near  to  man  as  his  own 
flesli  and  blood,  is  full  charged  with  the  divinest 
influences.  A  man  must  forget  his  home  if  he 
forgets  to  love.  Love  is  of  God,  for  God  is  love. 
See  you  not  how  these  little  ones  unseal  its  purest 
fountains,  and  keep  them  ever  flowing,  to  draw 
some  tinge  of  living  greenness  over  the  driest  and 
barest  life  ? 

II.  These  little  ones  are  sent  to  us  that  we 
may  learn  through  them  the  lessons  of  sacrifice, 
and  taste  its  joys. 

The  life  of  a  true  father  is  a  constant  offering 
of  himself  for  his  children.  You  would  not  wear 
yourself  out  with  your  daily  toils  but  for  these 
little  ones  who  are  fed  by  them,  and  who  are 
lifted  up  by  your  patient  industry  to  a  higher 
level  of  culture  than  in  this  fife  you  can  hope  to 


These  Little  Ones.  4tl 

reacli.  And  tliere  is  no  pleasure  whicli  yon  taste 
so  sweet  as  tliat  wliich  you  win  for  yonr  children. 
To  see  them  bright  and  glad  is  the  rich  repayment 
of  sore  toil  and  pain.  God  will  have  ns  live  out 
of  ourselves;  in  other  words,  He  will  have  us 
love;  for  to  live  self-enfolded  is  death.  Com- 
merce, ministry,  interchange  of  gifts  and  offices, 
is  the  one  principle  of  life.  The  home,  the  thing 
on  earth  most  near  to  us,  is  the  main  organ  of 
its  development.  There  is  an  altar  of  sacrifice 
whose  fire  is  ever  burning  in  every  household, 
and  all  the  richest  and  purest  joys  of  the  house- 
hold spring  out  of  the  offerings  which  are  laid 
upon  its  shrine.  In  a  home  it  is  your  power  to 
give  which  makes  your  riches,  your  power  to 
gladden,  which  kindles  your  joy.  Give  nothing, 
get  nothing  ;  sow  nothing,  reap  nothing ;  bear  no 
burden  of  others,  be  crushed  under  your  own. 
Deny  thyself,  seek  not  thine  own  good,  but  the 
good  of  these  little  ones,  and  see  how  they  hasten 
to  shower  the  smiles  which  are  bright  as  sun- 
beams on  thy  life. 

"  Ye  'know  the  grace  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christy 
that  though  He  was  rich^  yet  for  your  sokes  He 
heoame  jpoor,  that  ye  through  His  poverty  might  he 
richy      The  bliss  of  heaven  grows  out  of  that 


48  The  Borne  Life. 

great  sacrifice.  Study  it,  drink  deeply  of  its 
spirit,  it  is  the  spring  of  tlie  most  perfect  bliss  of 
life.  For  love  transforms  sacrifice  and  denial. 
The  freest  and  healthiest  action  of  the  being  is 
that  which  is  most  destructive  to  the  selfishness 
of  self.  Wonderful,  most  wonderful,  is  the  pow- 
er of  these  little  ones  to  draw  forth  the  noblest 
energies  of  the  spirit,  and  to  give  them  such  play 
as  the  angels  might  envy  in  the  poorest  homes  and 
the  saddest  hearts. 

There  is  a  poor  widow  there  (I  am  not  draw- 
ing from  fancy)  with  a  troop  of  little  ones  round 
her ;  the  youngest,  a  sickly  fretful  infant,  needing 
constant  tending,  while  the  ceaseless  toil  of  her 
hands  just  finds  them  bread.  Day  after  day,  the 
long  week  through,  and  often  far  into  the  night 
she  slaves, — ^no,  no  slave  works  like  her;  one 
hand  and  eye  upon  her  tasks,  and  one  upon  her 
moaning,  restless  child.  Have  you  ever  seen  the 
look  of  a  breaking  heart  in  a  care-worn,  life-weary 
mother's  face,  when  the  little  ones  are  crying 
J  round  her  for  bread,  and  she  dares  not  for  their 
Sear  sakes  relax  the  strain,  while  the  trembling 
hands  retain  their  cunning,  and  the  will  can  flog 
the  limbs  to  their  tasks  ?  Have  you  ever  heard 
her  moan  for  rest,  the  only  rest  that  can  help  her, 


These  Little  Ones.  49 

when  the  heart-strings  were  strung  to  breaking- 
strain,  and  the  crj  of  the  little  ones  grew  too  bit- 
ter to  be  borne  ?  I  have,  and  I  have  seen,  too, 
that  somehow  still  the  sickly  one  got  tended,  and 
somehow  still  the  work  got  itself  done.  I  have 
seen  this,  and  I  have  been  ready  to  bow  down  in 
that  poor  home  and  worship  as  in  the  vestibule 
of  the  heavenly  temple ;  whence  clearer  eyes  be- 
hold love's  ministry,  and  a  sm'er  hand  inscribes 
the  record  which  will  be  read  ont  by  tender  sym- 
pathetic voices  at  that  great  day,  not  unnoted  of 
the  King  of  kings.* 

These  little  ones.  Bear  with  them,  toil  for 
them,  suffer  for  them,  live  in  their  life,  be  glad  in 
their  joy.  Thus  shall  you  have  the  blessing  with 
which  God  has  freighted  them,  to  fill  your  homes 
with  light  and  love.  How  many  of  the  most 
precious  pearls  of  home,  like  the  pearls  of  the 
deep  sea,  grow  round  wounds,  and  are  the  costly 
burials  of  pain ! 

III.  These  little  ones  are  sent  to  us  surely  tp 
hold  up  the  mirror  to  our  evil  habits  and  pas- 
sions, that  we  may  learn  to  hate  them  as  God 
hates  them,  and  may  join  the  energy  of  our  will 
3 


50  The  Home  Life, 

to  His  in  the  effort  to  master  them,  and  to  put 
them  away. 

Eve  knew  what  sin  meant,  and  what  sin  had 
done  in  God's  home,  when  Abel  lay  dead  on  her 
bosom.  She  knew  then,  too,  what  God  had 
meant,  and  what  God  had  suffered  by  death.  It 
is  the  very  grandest  instrument  of  man's  moral 
culture,  this  home  institution — these  little  ones, 
in  whom,  if  we  cherish  our  vices,  passions,  and 
sins,  they  repeat  themselves  with  startling  vivid- 
ness and  ghastly  ugliness.  Can  any  horror  be 
imagined  more  dreadful  than  -  that  which  would 
seize  the  soul  of  a  drunken  father,  not  utterly 
brutalised,  if  he  saw  his  child  mimicking  his  stut- 
tering voice  or  staggering  step,  or  beginning  while 
yet  a  child  to  tread  in  stern  recklessness  the  same 
swift  pathway  to  the  pit  ?  There  is  many  a  par- 
ent who  will  read  these  words  who  would  be 
filled  with  shame  and  sadness  if  he  were  to  see, 
as  the  eyes  above  us  see,  his  children  reproduce 
the  tempers,  vices,  and  blasphemies  with  which 
he  is  cursing  his  home. 

And  they  will  repeat  them.  You  are  as  gods 
to  them  in  their  young  childhood.  God  hath 
made  them  to  yield  to  you  the  reverence  and 
homage  which  He  claims //♦^wi  you.     Alas  for  the 


These  Little  Ones.  51 

hour  when  they  find  that  their  gods  are  gods  of. 
clay,  and  learn  to  slight  and  scorn,  and  it  may  be 
hate,  the  parent,  whom  God  made  as  a  parent  in 
the  image  of  Himself!  It  is  the  most  bitter,  the 
most  irreparable  wrong  that  you  can  inflict  upon 
them,  to  drive  them  to  fear,  to  shrink  from,  to 
hate,  what  God  made  them  to  honour,  serve,  and 
love.  Well  if  it  does  not  shatter  the  whole 
framework  of  their  moral  being,  and  tempt  them 
to  yield  to  the  devil  that  passionate  devotion 
whose  inspiration  is  despair.  God  sets  your  chil- 
dren in  your  presence  continually,  as  an  ever- 
present  and  most  powerful  memento  of  the  fact 
and  the  fatal  fruit  of  transgression.  You  cannot 
indulge  one  passion  in  your  home,  you  cannot 
give  the  rein  to  one  lust,  you  cannot  accept  the 
world  or  self  as  your  ruling  inspiration,  but  it 
passes  forth  into  your  children  and  begets  its  like- 
ness, and  then  rises  up  a  ghastly  image,  to  haunt 
you  at  your  own  hearthfire.  Blessings  bright  as 
heaven  can  send  you,  or  torments  sharp  as  the 
goads  of  hell,  are  these  little  ones.  You  may 
choose  to  make  them  the  brand  of  your  dishon- 
our, or  the  crown  of  your  glory ;  the  long  joy, 
or  the  long  shame  and  misery  of  your  eternity. 


52  The  Home  Life. 

•These  little  ones,  take  heed  that  ye  despise  them 
not! 

And  what  is  it  to  despise  or  to  offend  them  ? 
More  of  this  when  I  come  to  speak  of  their  edu- 
cation. Meanwhile  a  few  earnest  words.  Do  not 
let  them  feel  that  there  is  no  room  for  them,  no 
food  for  them,  no  love  for  them,  in  this  wide, 
bright  world.  It  is  an  awful  thing  to  let  a  little 
one,  one  of  God's  little  ones,  grow  up  to  feel  that 
the  world  is  a  hard  prison-house,  and  life  a  long 
pain;  cuffed,  kicked,  tossed  hither  and  thither, 
till  the  young  heart  that  ought  to  be  so  glad  nes- 
tles near  to  death,  with  a  quiet  sense  that  it  is 
getting  near  to  all  that  it  can  dream  of  as  peace. 
I  read  this  in  the  papers  the  other  day.  Such 
things,  alas !  may  be  read  there  most  days.  Let 
us  look  at  it  for  a  moment,  and  try  to  realise 
something  of  what  this  little  one  endured. 

"  Destitution  and  DEATn. — Last  evening,  Mr.  Eichards, 
deputy-coroner,  held  an  inquest  at  the  Ship  and  Shears 
Tavern,  Lower  Shadwell,  touching  the  death  from  destitu- 
tion and  exposure  of  Ann  Andrews,  aged  eleven.  Mary 
Ann  Andrews,  of  5  Victoria  Place,  Shadwell,  said  that  she 
was  the  wife  of  a  bricklayer,  who  abandoned  her  two  years 
ago,  and  left  her  with  eight  children  to  support.  She 
worked  at  a  dust-yard  for  1«.  2^.  a  day  for  some  time,  but 


These  Little  Ones.  53 

fell  into  sucli  a  state  of  destitution  that  she  was  compelled 
to  apply  to  the  parish  for  assistance.  The  parish  passed 
her  and  six  children  down  to  WisbeacH.  "When  down  there 
she  asked  the  parish  authorities  at  Wisbeach  for  assistance, 
and  they  agreed  to  give  her  9s.  a  week  to  go  up  to  London. 
On  Monday  week  they  gave  her  95.  in  advance,  and  she  set 
out  to  walk  up  to  London,  a  distance  of  a  hundred  miles, 
with  the  children,  of  whom  the  deceased  was  the  eldest. 
On  the  way  they  once  got  a  night's  lodging  at  a  union ;  on 
the  other  nights  they  slept  in  lodging-houses.  Excepting 
the  95.,  they  had  nothing  except  one  loaf  of  bread,  which  a 
lady,  taking  compassion  on  them  as  they  walked  along,  gave 
them.  They  arrived  in  London  on  the  Saturday  morning. 
The  deceased  frequently  complained  on  the  road.  "When 
they  arrived  in  Shadwell  they  took  a  room  at  2s.  a  week. 
The  deceased  died  on  Thursday.  Dr.  George  Sprey  said  he 
was  called  in  to  the  deceased.  He  found  her  dead,  lying  on 
the  floor  of  a  room  in  which  there  was  no  bed  or  other  fur- 
nitare.  The  ^ost-mortem  examination  showed  the  stomach 
and  intestines  to  be  empty.  Death  resulted  from  inflamma- 
tion of  the  bronchial  tubes,  and  was  accelerated  by  fatigue, 
exposure,  and  want  of  the  common  necessaries  of  life.  The 
Coroner  having  summed  up,  the  jury  returned  a  verdict 
that  the  deceased  was  found  dead  from  bronchitis  and  the 
mortal  effects  of  fatigue,  exposure,  and  destitution." 

Think  how  the  morning  light,  which  summons 
you  from  a  hixurious  bed  to  a  well  spread  board, 
broke  over  that  shivering,   starving  little   one. 


54  The  Home  Life. 

Think  how  all  the  glad  sights  and  sounds  of  the 
bountiful  creation  jarred  to  agonj  on  that  hungry, 
death-weary  heart.  She  might  have  envied,  but 
that  her  heart  was  too  numb,  the  birds  and  the 
lilies,  and  groaned  over  her  fatal  inheritance  of 
the  destinies  of  a  human  child.  Methinks  there 
may  come  to  be  countries  of  which  the  Lord  of 
"  these  little  ones  "  may  say,  "  It  were  better  for 
them  that  a  millstone  were  hanged  about  their 
necks,  and  they  were  drowned  in  the  depths  of 
the  sea." 

Think  tenderly  of  these  myriad  little  ones 
whom  the  morning  light  wakes  up  to  hunger, 
filth,  and  wretchedness ;  while  the  evening  shad- 
ows hunt  them  into  lairs  in  which  you  would  not 
care  to  couch  your  beasts.  Think  of  them.  You 
cannot  mend  it  all,  but  you  can  do  something ; 
you  can  bless  and  strengthen  the  hands  that  are 
mending  it,  and  which  seek  and  claim  the  young 
outcasts  of  life  with  long-suffering  patience  and 
unwearying  gentleness,  because  they  are  the 
lambs  of  the  fold  of  Christ.  Of  all  the  efforts 
which  the  Church  puts  forth — and  the  Church  is 
coming  more  and  more  to  be  identified  with  the 
Christian  charity  of  the  times — to  heal  the  sick- 
ness and  cleanse  the  leprosy  of  society,  there  is 


These  Little  Ones.  55 

none  wMcli  claims  sucli  honour  as  the  endeavour 
to  snatch  young  children,  by  education,  by  indus- 
trial training,  by  yigilant  oyersight — true  episco- 
pal work — ^from  the  pits  of  perdition  which  our 
splendid  commercial  activity  has  opened  in  every 
town  and  village  in  our  land. 

Take  heed  that  ye  despise  them  not.  Rever- 
ence their  purity,  their  simplicity,  their  inno- 
cence, their  unworldliness.  Smile  not  at  it  from 
your  superior  pedestal,  but  pray  that  you  may 
grow  into  its  likeness.  Be  converted,  and  become 
as  a  little  child  again,  like  those  grand  strong 
men,  the  apostolic  company.  Paul,  the  aged, 
was  fresh  and  sirriple  as  a  child,  while  his  arm 
was  strong  enough  to  shake  the  world.  See  that 
you  stain  not  the  tissues  and  foul  not  the  springs 
of  their  young  lives  by  the  taint  of  your  vices. 
How  many  fretful,  puny,  crippled  children  bear 
through  life  the  burden  of  the  sins  of  their  sires ! 
Do  not  warp  their  apprehension  of  righteousness 
and  goodness  by  admiring  tales  of  brilliant  scamps 
and  triumphant  cheats.  Beware  how  you  inter- 
pose the  medium  of  a  hard,  selfish,  and  worldly 
nature  between  their  souls  and  the  voices  which 
God  has  made  them  quick  to  hsten  to,  and  which 
preach  from  stars  and  birds  and  lilies  of  the  field, 


66  Tlie  Home  Life. 

and  friends,  and  heroes  of  the  past,  gentleness, 
courage,  constancy,  and  love.  Let  no  gusts  of 
passion  storm  tlirougli  your  home,  and  lay  these 
innocent  flowers  stained  and  broken  in  the  dust ; 
and  tempt  them  not  to  think,  as  the  world  is 
tempting  us  all  to  think,  by  what  you  do  and  de- 
light in,  that  Christ  was  dreaming  when  He  said, 
"  Except  ye  he  converted^  and  heoome  as  little  chil- 
dren, ye  shall  not  enter  into  the  Tcingdom  of  heav- 


III. 

THE  JUST  MASTER 

"  Masters^  give  unto  your  servants  tJiat  which  is  just  and 
equal;  Icnowiiig  that  ye  also  have  a  Master  in  heaven?'' 
—Col.  iv.  1. 

Society,  under  modem  influences — of  wliicli, 
perhaps,  the  most  powerful  in  our  time  is  com- 
merce— tends  to  form  itself  into  two  hostile 
camps,  each  fully  armed  and  on  guard  against 
the  other;  as  keen  and  suspicious  as  were  the 
combatants,  at  the  most  critical  eras  of  the  patri- 
cian and  plebeian  warfare  in  republican  Home. 
There  were  two  camps  in  the  ancient  time,  there 
are  two  camps  in  the  modern ;  but  between  these 
eras  lies  the  feudal  age,  and  we  are  the  heirs  of 
the  legacy  which  it  has  bequeathed.  The  feudal 
age,  far  from  being,  as  is  popularly  conceived,  a 
system  of  organised  tyranny,  was  truly  a  system 
of  relations  and  duties.  The  scheme  was  very 
roughly  framed,  the  duties  were  very  ill  observed, 
3* 


58  The  Home  Life. 

as  .Cliristian  duties  are  in  these  times-;  but  still, 
througli  tlie  whole,  the  duty  of  man  to  man,  with 
the  practical  obligations  which  grew  out  of  it,  was 
the  paramount  idea.  This  created  a  unity  in  feu- 
dal society,  within  whose  bounds,  no  doubt, 
classes  and  interests  were  fiercely  at  war,  the  idea 
of  which  was  purely  Christian.  The  ideas  and 
habits  which  we  inherit  from  the  feudal  age,  or 
rather  which  we  derive  through  it  from  a  higher 
source,  are  a  protest  against  this  dire  division,  and 
a  uniting  influence  which  will  in  time  weld  even 
our  complex  social  system  into  a  higher  and  com- 
pleter unity  than  any  which  has  been  hitherto 
realised  in  our  world.  For  to  this  everything 
tends — ^unity,  in  higher  and  yet  higher  forms, 
through  long  and  circuitous  paths,  but  with  this 
end,  blessed  be  God,  ever  in  sight. 

But,  for  the  present,  the.  prospect  seems  a  dark 
one.  The  two  camps  are  thoroughly  organised 
and  sharply  divided ;  the  "  cause  of  war "  is  in- 
dustry and  its  fruits.  Since  the  great  political 
question  was  settled  in  England  by  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  principle  of  the  Reform  Bill  a  genera- 
tion ago,  the  social  question  has  passed  steadily  to 
the  front.  They  must  be  blind  students  of  these 
times  who  cannot  see  that  this  question  of  capital 


The  Just  Master.  59 

and  industry  overtops  all  other  questions,  and  is 
tlie  great  battle-field  of  this  generation.  If  any 
are  in  doubt  of  its  magnitude  and  pressure,  I 
would  earnestly  advise  them  to  study  Mr.  Faw- 
cett's  "  Economic  Position  of  the  British  La- 
bourer," in  which  the  question  is  stated  with  con- 
vincing force  and  clearness;  though  there  may 
easily  be  wide  differences  of  opinion  as  to  the 
measures  by  which  he  believes  that  the  speedier 
solution  of  the  question  may  be  assured.  Has  the 
workman  the  right  to  seek  arid  look  for  some 
other  fruit  of  his  toil  than  the  bare  minimum  at 
which,  in  this  sad  world,  where  so  many  are  al- 
T^ays  at  starving  point,  the  employer  can  manage 
to  get  it  decently  done  \  This  is  the  great  ques- 
tion Ivhich  the  workmen  in  Western  Europe  are 
endeavouring  to  have  settled,  though,  no  doubt, 
often  in  blundering  and  short-sighted  ways. 

The  science  of  worldly  interests,  which  proba- 
bly is  a  fair  definition  of  political  economy,  pre- 
cious as  its  teachings  are,  would  leave  us  in  a 
dead-lock  unless  some  help  were  to  be  brought  to 
us  from  a  higher  hand.  If  man  is  to  rest  in 
that  relation  to  man  which  worldly  interest  creates 
and  sustains — and  I  use  the  word  worldly  in  no 
scornful  sense ;  for,  while  we  live  on  earth,  we 


60  The  Home  Life. 

have  no  riglit  to  speak  otherwise  than  reverently 
of  the  world  and  worldly  things,  so  long  as  they 
observe  the  limits  of  their  sphere — society  must 
remain  two  hostile  camps  to  the  end  of  time. 
The  employer's  interest  leads  him  to  endeavour 
to  obtain  his  labour  at  the  lowest  price  at  which 
he  can  induce  men  to  offer  it ;  the  labourer's  in- 
terest leads  him  to  watch  keenly  for  every  oppor- 
tunity of  taking  his  employer  at  a  disadvantage, 
and  wi'inging  out  of  him  in  his  needs,  when  he 
has  a:  contract  pfl^^hand  and  at  like  seasons,  the 
price  of  which  he  feels,  rightly  or  wrongly,  that 
he  has  been  unjustly  deprived.  The  two  classes 
are  falling  continually  more  completely  into  the 
attitude  and  relation  of  hostile  armies,  each  hav- 
ing a  power  so  immense  and  an  organisation  so 
thorough,  that  their  contests  cannot  but  issue  in 
grievous  harm  and  loss  to  both.  I  constantly  hear 
men  of  business  speaking  very  gravely  of  the  po- 
sition of  employers  with  regard  to  their  workmen, 
and  complaining  that  after  the  present  •fashion 
things  cannot  go  on  long  at  all.  I  am  quite  sure 
that  the  workmen  share  the  feeling.  There  is 
deep  discontent  in  both  camps,  and  a  conviction 
that  the  direst  extremities  of  war  would  be  better 
than  the  long  continuance  of  this  armed  peace. 


The  Just  Master.  61 

And  there  are  some  wlio  look  into  and  read  the 
word  of  tlie  Lord,  wlio  ask  themselves  sadly,  why 
there  should  be  two  camps  at  all. 

It  is  complained,  and  justly,  that  none  of  the 
ancient  loyal  personal  relations  between  masters 
and  workmen  any  longer  subsist.  The  men  are 
a  great  army,  and  are  commanded  and  handled 
like  an  army ;  and  as  soldiers,  from  one  end  of  the 
land  to  the  other,  they  obey,  not  their  captains  of 
industry,  but  their  self-elected  chiefs.  The  mas- 
ters can  only  deal  with  them  in  the  gross,  and  by 
formal  stipulations  which  are  entered  into  by 
their  commanders,  and  can  hever  get  at  them  as 
individual  men,  having  thought,  will,  and  love  of 
their  own,  at  all.  Itds  a  true  complaint,  and  sad 
as  true.  The  old  bonds  have  well-nigh  disap- 
peared, and  the  personal  element  is  being  elimi- 
nated from  the  relations  of  the  world  of  industry ; 
as  the  leaders  of  a  powerful  scientific  school  of 
thought  are  endeavouring  to  eliminate  a  higher 
Person  from  a  wider  world.  It  is  said  that  the 
men  have  learnt  their  strength  in  combination. 
Probably  so ;  and  they  are  endeavouring  to  en- 
large it  by  combination  with  workmen  in  other 
lands.  But  most  certainly  capital  too  has  learnt 
its  power,  its  enormous  power,  of  increase.     It  un- 


62  The  Home  Life. 

derstands  perfectly  the  grand  style  in  its  opera- 
tions, and  it  employs  labour  upon  a  scale  wliicli 
renders  anything  like  the  old  personal  relation 
between  the  master  and  his  work-people  impossi- 
ble, and  the  idea  of  it  manifestly  absurd. 

The  fact  is  that  business  operations  are  being 
reduced  to  the  cold  certainty  and  seyerity  of  a 
science.  Men  are  really,  and  not  only  nominally, 
reckoned  by  hands,  and  no  longer  as  of  old  by 
souls.  And  if  hands  are  sought  without  much 
thought  or  care  of  the  souls  that  should  go  with 
them,  and  of  which  economical  science  takes  lit- 
tle account,  then  you  may  expect  hard,  sharp 
dealing  on  both  sides ;  and  every  advantage  will 
be  keenly  seized  which  will  make  the  hands  worth 
so  much  more  to  the  souls  that  own  them,  and  to 
the  souls  that  are  hanging  on  them  for  shelter  and 
food.  It  is  the  vast  scale  of  business,  and  the 
rigid  calculations  by  which  it  is  carried  on,  which 
has  eliminated  the  personal  element  fi^om  the  re- 
lations of  the  classes.  And  this  vast  scale  makes 
vast  profits.  Tens  of  thousands  are  ^thought  no 
more  of  now  than  hundreds  were  in  bygone  gen- 
erations. There  are  firms  in  our  great  commer- 
cial centres  which  give  away  annually  in  promis- 
cuous charity,  to  cases  which  they  know  nothing 


The  Just  Master.  63 

and  care  nothing  about,  but  wbidi  are  introduced 
by  good  customers,  a  sum  wbicb  would  have  been 
reckoned  a  handsome  income  from  a  large  busi- 
ness thirty  years  ago.  And  these  vast  profits  are 
no  secret.  "  The  hands  "  will  have  eyes  belong- 
ing to  them  which  will  look  hungrily  at  your  Go- 
shens,  and  minds,  too,  which  will  ponder  much 
upon  the  question,  why  is  it  that  capital,  got  to- 
gether in  a  few  years,  is  making  thousands  out  of 
this  business,  while  for  me  a  halfpenny  an  hour  is 
a  grand  advance,  for  which,  too,  I  had  to  fight 
desperately  till  I  was  well-nigh  starved  to  death  ? 
This  is  the  question  which  industry  is  earnestly 
pondering,  and  which  will  have  to  be  settled  on 
some  other  basis  than  the  present,  if  the  two 
camps^  are  ever  to  be  one. 

ITow  it  is  very  easy  work  indeed  for  us  to  rail 
at  political  economy,  and  to  paint  pleasant  fancy 
pictures  of  an  ideal  state  of  industry,  in  which 
the  comforts  and  advantages  of  the  workman  shall 
advance  precisely  in  the  same  ratio  as  those  of  his 
chief;  in  which  wages  shall  be  fixed  by  kindly 
sentiment,  and  all  shall  be  conducted  according 
to  the  highest  moral  ideas.  But  neither  senti- 
ment nor  the  invocation  of  the  past  will  help  us ; 
the  path  lies  onward  through  stern  realities  of 


64  The  Home  Life. 

struggle  and  suffering,  in  which  the  real  interest 
of  the  classes  must  be  our  guide.  We  have  to 
thank  political  economy  for  laying  bare  the  naked 
facts  and  laws  of  the  industrial  relations  and  in- 
terests of  mankind.  "We  are  thankful  to  be  made 
to  understand  upon  what  rigid  lines  of  law  the 
industries  arrange  themselves ;  and  how  any  tam- 
pering with  the  fundamental  laws  of  the  art  and 
mystery  of  commerce  avenges  itself  speedily,  and 
for  the  most  part  with  sharpest  stroke  on  those  in 
whose  supposed  interests  the  tampering  has  been 
tried. 

It  is  most  necessary,  too,  that  the  money  worth 
of  a  man's  labour  should  be  settled,  by  trying 
where  the  master's  interest  in  keeping  it  down, 
and  the  man's  interest  in  keeping  it  up,  balance 
each  other  fairly.  Wages  cannot  be  fixed  by 
fancy  or  by  philanthropy.  We  must  know  the 
point  at  which  the  opposing  interests  fix  them, 
the  just  measure  in  the  economical  scale,  before 
higher  considerations,  which  also  have  to  do  with 
the  matter,  come  into  play.  The  conclusions  of 
economical  science  are  as  important  in  this  social 
sphere,  as  to  an  artist  is  the  knowledge  of  the 
size,  shape,  and  use  of  the  bones  and  muscles 
which  he  has  to  show  to  us  clothed  with  flesh. 


Tlie  Just  Master.  65 

Let  us  know  what  the  science  delivers  to  ns  as  its 
dicta,  and  then  let  ns  be  snre  that  no  good  can 
come  to  ns  by  dealing  with  them  as  other  than 
hard  substantial  facts,  which  ,will  have  recogni- 
tion, or  will  exact  a  penalty,  if  not  recognised, 
which  will  leav^e  no  room  for  future  ■  mistakes. 
'Love  is  blind  until  instructed.  Cultivated  intelli- 
gence helps  it  immensely  in  its  ministry.  Politi- 
cal economy  is  a  kind  of  horn-book,  for  the  in- 
struction of  the  labourers  in  the  field  of  a  Chris- 
tian civilisation.  The  true  and  complete  relations 
of  men,  when  they  are  discovered,  or  rather  de- 
veloped, will  comprehend  all  their  rights,  inter- 
ests, and  lawful  claims.  It  is  well  that  these 
should  be  subjected  to  the  processes  of  a  search- 
ing scientific  criticism;  let  us  know  them  thor- 
oughly, and  not  be  afraid  to  go  through  much 
struggle  and  sufiering,  in  order  to  their  being  es- 
tablished ;  but  let  us  understand  clearly  that  so- 
ciety cannot  rest  on  them ;  the  body  must  have  a 
living  soul,  and  that  can  be  quickened  and  nour- 
ished only  from  a  divine  spring. 

The  purely  economical  basis  on  which  the  re- 
lations of  employers  and  employed  are  made  to 
rest,  is  confessed  on  all  hands  to  be  bringing  so- 
H  ciety  to  a  dead  lock.     The  alienation  of  spirit, 

I 


66  The  Home  Life. 

and  tlie  restless  struggle  of  interests,  wliicLi  are 
engendered,  have  become  intolerable.  One  hears 
confident  prophecies,  on  the  one  hand,  that  our 
labourers  will  littla  by  little  filter  out  of  the  land 
to  regions  whose  wealthy  promise  beckons  them 
from  afar ;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  masters  prog- 
nosticate the  speedy  lapse  of  industries  by  which 
our  commonwealth  has  long  been  nobly  distin- 
guished, and  the  transference  of  our  commercial 
supremacy  to  foreign  powers.  One  cannot  but  lis- 
ten to  such  prophecies  gravely — there  is  too  much 
basis  for  them.  And  yet  there  is  no  need  to  hear 
them  despondingly,  for  there  are  strong  signs  of 
life  about  us  yet,  and  where  there  is  life  there  is 
hope.  The  nation  which  in  successive  genera- 
tions has  given  to  the  world  the  steam-engine,  the 
steam-boat,  the  railway,  and  the  electric  tele- 
graph, is,  may  we  not  fairly  hope,  still  far  from 
the  beginning  of  its  industrial  decline  ?  But  the- 
gravity  of  the  present  state  of  afi'airs  cannot  be 
exaggerated,  and  those  who  are  very  far  from 
being  alarmists  tell  us  that  things  cannot  much 
longer  go  on  as  they  are. 

The  reason  of  this  is  simply,  that  human  af- 
fairs cannot  long  get  on  without  humanity,  and 
that  no  machine  works  so  badly  as  the  human  if 


i  The  Just  Master,  67 

treated  simply  as  a  machine.     I  am  not  So  foolish 
as  to  enter  on  the  thorny  question  of  the  read- 
justment of  the  relations  of  capital  and  labour, 
in  the  introduction  to  a  brief  discourse,  nor  should 
I  in  any  case  feel  competent  to  the  task.     But 
one  can  hardly  enter  upon  the  consideration  of 
the  subject  of  masters  and  servants  without  look- 
ing wider  afield,  and  casting  a  glance  at  the  larger 
.  relations  which  originally  wore  an  almost  domes- 
tic form,  and  on  which  the  welfare  and  progress 
of  society  so  greatly  depend.     And  without  ven- 
turing into  the  domain  of  which  ministers  are 
held  to  be  constitutionally  ignorant,  I  may  be  al- 
lowed to  express  an  earnest  conviction,  that  if 
ever  the  camps  of  industry  are  to  become  one 
camp  again,  the  old  personal  relation  of  loyalty 
between  captains  and  soldiers  must  in  some  way 
or  other  be  restored.     And  the  thing  can  be  done. 
There  are  vast  mercantile  establishments  in  which 
the  thing  is  done — ^not  by  kindness,  we  expect  too 
much  from  kindness — ^but  by  wise,  provident,  and 
righteous  arrangements  on  the  part  of  masters, 
involving  no  small  sacrifices,  whereby  the  work- 
men are  made  sharers  in  the  prosperity  which  has 
been  created  by  their  toil. 

The  only  power  which  can  stand  up  against 


68  The  Home  Life, 

tlie  tyranny  whicli  tlie  workmen,  driven  into  a 
hostile  attitude,  allow  tlieir  own  leaders  to  exer- 
cise over  them — the  extent  of  which  fills  one  with 
amazement,  and  which  Tnust  be  degrading  to  the 
manly  nature  of  the  classes  which  submit  to  it 
— will  be  found  in  the  influence  of  a  master  who 
has  learnt  the  true  secret  of  command  in  the 
great  army  of  industry,  and  knows  the  art  of  gov- 
erning men.  There  are  "  concerns  "  in  this  coun- 
try from  which  no  combination  could  win  or  ter- 
rify the  workmen ;  when  such  multiply,  and  be- 
come the  rule  instead  of  the  exception,  the  prob- 
lem of  industry  in  a  Christian  sense  will  be  solved, 
and  commerce  in  a  Christian  sense  will  be  saved. 
And  that  I  may  not  appear  to  you  to  be  talking 
idly  in  pressing  these  views  upon  you,  let  me  shel- ' 
ter  myself  under  the  authority  of  a  great  name. 
Mr.  Fawcett,  in  a  book  which  has  just  appeared, 
and  to  which  I  have  already  referred,  deals  with 
this  solution  of  the  difficulty  as  a  very  practical 
and  promising  feature  of  the  industrial  life  of  our 
times. 

"  I  am  chiefly  induced  to  anticipate  the  future 
of  our  country  with  confidence  and  wdth  hope, 
because  each  year  sui)plies  some  gratifying  in- 
dication, that  our  present  industrial  economy  is 


The  Just  Master.  69 

susceptible  of  a  beneficent  change.  Twenty  years 
since,  cooperation  was  looked  upon  as  the  mis- 
chievous dream  of  democrats,  and  copartnership 
was  never  mentioned  without  provoking  the  con- 
temptuous derision  of  practical  men.  You  are 
familiar  with  some  of  the  great  achievements  of 
the  cooperative  movement,  and  before  many  years 
have  passed,  there  is  every  reason  to  suppose  that 
in  many  of  our  largest  commercial  establishments 
a  copartnership  between  capital  and  labour  will 
have  been  established.  It  is  impossible  to  exag- 
gerate the  blessings  and  the  material  advantages 
which  may  result  from  thus  uniting  capital  and 
labour,  for  the  antagonism  of  these  interests  has 
been  fruitful  of  the  most  baneful  consequences. 
Some  successful  schemes  of  copartnership  have 
been  described  in  a  previous  chapter.  The  Messrs. 
Crossley  of  Halifax,  who  employ  between  four 
thousand  and  %^q  thousand  hands,  and  whose 
carpet  manufactory  is  perhaps  the  largest  in  the 
world,  have  established  a  copartnership  between 
capital  and  labour.  They  have  converted  their 
business  into  a  joint-stock  company ;  they  have 
retained  a  certain  proportion  of  the  shares  them- 
selves, and  have  preferentially  allotted  the  remain- 
der amongst  their  workmen.     The  workmen  are 


10  The  Home  Life. 

to  be  represented  on  the  board  of  direction.  It 
is  manifest  that  those  who  are  employed  in  this 
establishment  are  placed  in  an  entirely  different 
position  compared  with  the  ordinary  labourers. 
The  antagonism  of  interests  between  employers 
and  employed  is  at  once  destroyed,  and  thus  har- 
mony and  sympathy  will  take  the  place  of  hos- 
tility and  distrust.  The  dull  monot6ny  which 
must  depress  human  energy  if  no  other  prospect 
is  offered  except  to  work  through  life  for  daily 
wag^,  will  rapidly  vanish;  for  a  man's  career 
will  seem  to  be  bright  with  hope  and  promise,  if 
he  knows  that  some  self-denial  will  enable  him  to 
save  sufficient  to  make  him  a  partner  in  the  par- 
ticular business  to  which  his  labour  is  applied. 
It  will,  of  course,  be  said  that  such  schemes  are 
impracticable,  that  trade  could  not  be  carried  on 
if  masters  were  subject  to  the  interference  which 
they  would  have  to  endure,  supposing  they  per- 
mitted their  labourers  to  become,  even  in  a  modi- 
fied sense,  their  partners.  But  the  practical  diffi- 
culties of  the  scheme  will  soon  receive  a  solution. 
It  need  only  be  said  that  those  who  have  suggest- 
ed and  are  making  the  experiment  are  men  who 
are  unrivalled  for  their  commercial  sagacity  and 


The  Just.  Master.  Yl 

ability ;  tliey  speak  confidently  of  its  success." — 
Fawcett,  pp.  244-24:6. 

I  have  heard,  too,  quite  recently,  that  a  very 
large  firm  of  high  standing  in  the  city  placed  in 
the  hands  of  each  of  their  employes  as  a  l^ew 
Year's  gift,  an  envelope,  containing  a  per  centage, 
in  proportion  to  the  salary,  of  the  profits  of  the 
year.     They  are  likely  to  be  nobly  served. 

They  say  that  the  home-life  is  the  rehearsal 
of  the  great  world-life.  Certainly  this  relation 
of  master  and  workman  began  in  old  time  upon 
the  domestic  idea.  It  has  fairly  broken  loose 
from  it  now.  But  surely  the  relations  of  master 
and  servant  ifl  the  home  circle,  ought  to  prepare 
us  for  the  wise  and  righteous  handhng  of  the 
larger  questions  of  rule  and  service  which  vex 
and  distract  our  times.  To  the  consideration  of 
them  we  will  now  proceed. 

I.  The  relations  of  master  and  servant  spring 
inevitably  out  of  the  constitution  of  human  so- 
ciety, as  it  has  been  ordained  by  its  Lord. 

It  is  not  good  for  man  to  be  alone.  It  is  not 
good  for  a  class  to  be  alone.  The  mutual  rela- 
tions of  richer  and  poorer,  wiser  and  more  igno- 
rant,  stronger   and  weaker,   finer    and    coarser, 


72  Tlie  Home  Life, 

higlier  and  lower,  lie  at  the  root  of  all  the  nobler 
life  and  progress  of  society.  Developement  only 
begins  where  differences  are  established  within 
the  bosom  of  a  unity.  God  has  so  constituted 
and  endowed  man,  that  these  differences  are  in- 
evitable. IsTay,  if  men  are  to  rule  and  to  serve, 
there  is  divine  example  for  it.  They  will  find  the 
image  of  it  in  the  life  of  God.  One  who  was 
God,  "  learnt  obedience  by  the  things  which  He 
suffered."  The  doctrine  of  equality  has  not  a 
shadow  of  support  in  any  region  of  the  universe. 
Superior  suns  rule  inferior  planets  everywhere. 
The  very  dust  has  its  master  and  subject  elements. . 
The  struggle  to  adjust  their  relations  has  left  its 
record  in  every  fragment  of  rock,  every  splinter 
of  crystal  which  you  tread  beneath  your  feet. 
Your  gardens  have  their  kingly  and  queenly  flow- 
ers, their  masses  of  vulgar  beauty,  and  their  troop 
of  unnoted,  undistinguished  helots  for  daily  office 
and  common  use.  You  cannot  get  into  a  region 
where  a  level  is  suggested  as  God's  idea  of  per- 
fectness.  Suppose  you  cut  down  all  the  poppy- 
heads,  all  the  flowers  which  flaunt  themselves  so 
bravely  in  the  sun,  as  they  did  in  the  first  French 
Eevolution.  What  would  be  the  next  sight  which 
would  greet   you?      N'ew  masters  lifting  thgn- 


The  Just  Master.  Y3 

selves  above  the  level  with  more  bold  assertion 
than  ever,  of  their  right  to  the  front  rank  in 
the  procession,  the  front  seats  in  the  theatre  of 
life. 

The  deadliest  thing  to  my  mind  about  the  so- 
cialist theory  of  society  is,  not  the  impiety  which 
ha^  been  so  constantly,  and  I  believe  on  the  whole 
inevitably  associated  with  it  (for  whatever  the 
plan  of  the  universe  may  be,  the  Maker  of  it  has 
not  built  it  to  the  socialist  scale) ;  nor  is  it  the 
crude  and  childish  principles  by  which  it  seeks  to 
reahse  its  idea;  but  it  is  the  idea  itself — the 
ghastly  thing  which  it  would  make  of  society  if 
it  had  its  way.  It  is  as  if  this  great  world  were 
just  the  herb  garden  of  the  palace  of  the  Eter- 
nal ;  where  men  are  set  like  rows .  of  cabbage 
plants,  and  have  to  stunt  their  godlike  nature  into 
the  cabbage  type,  as  swiftly  and  perfectly  as  they 
may.  Abolish  ranks,  orders,  classes,  in  society, 
and  you  begin  at  once  to  dwarf  the  human,  and 
in  the  end  you  destroy  all  that  makes  the  interest 
of  life  and  the  grandeur  of  man. 

The  world  in  its  states,  its  homes,  and  its  in- 
dustries, must  have  both  the  kings  and  the  sub- 
jects, the  masters  and  the  servants,  the  brain  and 
the  hands.  The  lords  and  the  vassals  of  labour, 
4 


74  The  Home  Life, 

the  masters  and  servants  in  homes,  grow  ont  of 
the  very  constitution  of  humanity.  Men  fit  into 
these  relations,  and  are  unfitted  ont  of  them. 
These  subordinations  are  not  the  fruit  of  evil, 
they  are  not  the  work  of  the  devil  in  our  world. 
The  fruit  of  evil,  the  work  of  the  devil  in  this 
region  is,  that  we  have  got  the  wrong  kings. 
Here  are  natural  authorities  and  subordinations, 
the  root  of  which  lies  deeply  imbedded  in  the  na- 
ture of  man  and  the  idea  of  society :  while  the 
fraud,  the  force,  the  natural  obHquity  of  human- 
ity, make  unnatural  ones ;  they  set  men  in  high 
places  who  have  no  power  of  rule  in  them,  and 
ask  men  to  obey  when  they  can  see  in  obedience 
no  reason,  and  no  right.  And  this — the  wrong 
men  uppermost — ^lies  at  the  root  of  a  great  deal 
of  the  wrong  and  misery  of  the  world. 

But  do  not  let  us  be  one-sided.  Society  does 
not  rest  quietly  in  this  work  of  the  devil,  and 
mistake  it  for  a  work  of  the  Lord.  It  struggles 
against  it,  it  strives  to  right  it ;  and  this  efibrt  of 
society  to  right  itself  upon  the  pivot  of  a  true  au- 
thority and  subordination,  is  the  spring  of  all  its 
revolutions  and  reformations,  and  of  all  the  deep- 
est and  most  hopeful  movements  of  our  times. 
Fools  in  places  of  authority,  knaves  in  places  of 


The  Just  Master,  T5 

trust,  tyrants  in  places  of  command,  cowards  in 
places  of  peril ;  here  are  the  parents  of  the  fail- 
ures and  the  miseries  of  life.  Obedience,  service, 
loyalty,  men  owe  to  the  office  partly,  to  the  order 
of  society  in  whose  arch  this  is  the  key-stone. 
But  how  hard  and  sore  the  perplexity  becomes 
when  the  office  is  one  of  high  use  and  honour,  the 
man  only  useless  and  base  !  Kebellious  questions 
rise  then  in  the  hearts  of  the  noblest  to  torment 
them.  They  rise  more  easily  in  the  hearts  of  the 
self-willed  and  reckless,  and  then  they  torment 
the  world.  How  beautiful,  divinely  beautiful,  so- 
ciety might  grow  to  be,  were  the  Lord's  elect  its 
captains  ;  were  its  rulers  righteous  and  its  teach- 
ers wise,  its  judges  just,  its  bishops  apostolic,  its 
rich  compassionate,  its  soldiers  humane!  "Were 
none  called  to  yield  obedience  but  where  God 
showed  the  right  to  claim  it,  were  the  pulses  of 
the  common  life  but  harmonious  with  the  pulses 
of  the  heavenly  life,  did  progress  move  to  the  mu- 
sic of  righteousness  and  charity,  the  Lord  might 
look  on  the  world  which  He  had  made,  and 
breathe  over  it  once  more  the  benediction,  "  Be- 
hold it  is  very  good." 

n.  The  question  of  good  servants  is  funda- 


76  The  Home  L%fe, 

mentally  a  question  of  good  masters,  good  sub- 
jects, of  good  kings. 

I^ot  wholly,  but  mainly.  If  God  made  tlie 
relation,  it  must  be  so.  If  God  made  men  to  be 
rulers  and  men  to  be  ruled,  and  if  He  has  im- 
planted in  them  instincts  which  move  them  tow- 
ards these  relations,  and  will  allow  them  to  rest 
in  no  other,  the  responsibility  of  failure,  if  the 
results  go  wrong,  must  rest  mainly  with  those  who 
occupy  the  higher  position  in  the  scale.  It  is  as 
though  God  said  to  them  by  the  very  constitution 
of  society,  "  Rule  wisely  and  righteously,  and  I 
charge  Myself  with  the  obedience  and  welfare  of 
the  ruled."  And  on  the  whole,  if  you  want  to 
be  well  served  you  must  be  worth  serving.  Men 
will  not,  they  cannot,  spend  their  best  service  on 
a  craven  or  a  fool.  Men  want  inspiration  from 
their  rulers,  from  their  superiors,  in  every  way. 
They  want  an  intelligence  which  shall  bring  or- 
der into  the  confusion  of  their  thoughts,  an  ener- 
gy which  shall  stir  their  languor,  an  animation 
which  shall  fire  their  dulness,  a  purpose  which 
shall  gather  up  and  concentrate  all  their  power,  a 
magnet  which  shall  di^awthem  up  to  a  higher  lev- 
el of  life.  A  true  ruler  or  master  is  to  his  depend- 
ents as  music  is  to  an  army,  where  every  head  is 


The  Just  Master.  YY 

thrown  back,  every  limb  is  strung,  and  every  eye 
flashes  living  fire,  when  the  tones  of  the  inspiring 
battle-march  burst  upon  the  ear.  And  this  is 
what  sin  has  robbed  us  of — heaven's  music.  It 
has  turned  us  out  of  our  parade-ground,  to  slink 
through  the  miry  byways  of  a  beggarly  world. 
It  is  through  rulers,  men  with  the  instinct  and 
genius  of  command,  that  the  strains  are  to  reach 
us  again ;  and  when  men  hear  the  true  ring  in  the 
captain's  voice,  and  catch  the  gleam  of  the  true 
fire,  the  fire  of  energy  and  hope  in  his  eye,  a  thriU 
of  joy  passes  through  them;  every  power  stirs 
and  stands  attent,  they  gather  around  him  in 
troops  with  loyal  devotion,  and  feel  with  a  kind  of 
rapture  that  they  belong  to  a  living  army,  with 
leaders  and  comrades,  with  an  enemy,  a  battle,  and 
a  prize.  Men  are  born  soldiers ;  they  rise  to  their 
full  manhood  when  they  take  service  under  a  true 
captain  in  the  holy  war  of  industry  against  loafing, 
and  truth  against  lies.  Bless  God  if  He  has  set 
you  under  one  whom  you  can  look  up  to  with 
reverence,  one  in  whom  your  aspiration  seems  to 
be  realised,  whose  life  burns  to  an*intenser  heat, 
and  can  therefore  kindle  ^nd  nourish  your  own. 
These  are  our  captains,  the  men  and  women  who 
have  carried  all  that  we  dream  of  feebly,  and 


Y8  The  Rome  Life. 

more  feebly  aim  at,  into  some  fair  sliape  of  achieve- 
ment, and  who  are  therefore  magnetic  to  ns,  and 
draw  us  upward  by  the  image  of  our  idea.  Give 
us  men  and  women  whose  life  is  fresher  and  more 
vivid  than  that  of  the  mass  around  them,  whose 
spirit  is  purer,  whose  thought  is  clearer,  whose 
charity  is  more  large  and  free,  and  the  world 
will  not  be  long  in  finding  out  its  captainsj  who 
conduct  to  it  through  vital  channels  the  fire  and 
life  of  God. 

And  if  the  mass  thus  watch  for  these  leaders, 
and  greet  them  when  they  appear,  if  they  are 
ready,  nay,  if  they  press  to'  take  service  under 
them,  the  main  reason  why  there  are  so  many 
lazy,  vicious,  thankless,  thriftless  servants  must 
be,  because  there  are  so  many  vain,  empty-headed, 
empty-hearted,  selfish,  and  capricious  masters 
about  the  world.  And  here  I  am  very  anxious 
not  to  be  misunderstood.  We  say  that  good  par- 
ents make  good  children,  and  that  if  children  turn 
out  badly  it  must  be  mainly  the  parents'  fault. 
But  it  would  be  manifestly  wrong  to  ^^  thisinto 
an  absolute  rule  of  judgment,  and  to  lay  the  sin 
of  every  prodigal  at  the  parents'  door.  Still  less 
can  the  slighter  relationship  of  master  and  ser- 
vant give  reason  for  any  such  judgment,  which 


The  Just  Master.  *  T9 

would  make  tlie  servant's  *f oil j  the  master's  sin. 
A  good  master  may  happen  to  have  most  faulty 
servants,  and  his  best  endeavours  in  individual 
instances  may  lamentably  fail.  And  yet  it  will 
remain  true  on  the  whole  that  the  servant  is  as 
the  master  is,  and  that  if  after  the  course  of  gen- 
eration s  things  have  got  tangled  and  discordant, 
it  is  mainly  the  superior's  fault.  The  essential 
principle  of  good  service  is  loyalty,  the  sense  that 
the  ruler  is  the  right  man  to  rule,  and  that  his 
service  can  draw  forth  and  discipline  the  powers. 
There  may  be  much  good  service  rendered  to  a 
vain  and  selfish  master  by  one  who  has  learnt  the 
habit  of  obedience,  and  is  self-respectful  enough' 
to  maintain  it.  But  true  service  cannot  live  upon 
bare  duty.  The  dry  bread  of  duty  needs  the  wine 
of  loyalty  and  love  to  bring  out  its  nom^ishment. 
Service  gets  poor  and  cold  even  in  the  warmest 
and  bravest  heart,  if  there  be  no  glow  of  loyalty 
to  animate  it ;  while  in  all  but  the  bravest  and 
most  faithful  under  such  conditions  it  expires. 
Unless  the  lamp  of  obedience  be  fed  by  the  pm^e 
oil  of  a  noble  commandment,  it  burns  low,  motes 
gather  and  oppress  it,  it  runs  swiftly  to  waste,  and 
then  poisons  the  whole  air  with  the  fetid  breath 
of  its  decay.     We  want  noble  women  to  regener- 


80  ■  The  Home  Life, 

ate  homes,  we  want  true  masters  and  mistresses 
to  regenerate  service.  IS'otliing  is  of  liigher 
worth  to  an  age  or  country  than  service  whicfe  is 
loyal  and  energetic.  ]^ot  next  to  great  rulers,  but 
side  by  side  with  them,  on  the  same  level  of  dig- 
nity to  the  eye  of  Heaven,  stand  the  great  com- 
pany of  diligent  and  faithful  servants  of  their  fel- 
low-men. 

III.  "  Masters,  give  unto  your  servants,  that 
which  is  just  and  equal ;  knowing  that  ye  also 
have  a  Master  in  heavenP 

There  is  the  description  of  the  Christian  mas- 
ter, the  man  who  is  to  restore  the  fallen  relations 
of  rule  and  service  after  the  likeness  of  the  idea 
of  God.  It  had  all  been  terribly  jarred  and  jan- 
gled in  Paul's  days.  Bad  masters,  bad  servants ; 
no  centre  of  rule,  and  therefore  no  circumference 
of  service.  I  suppose  that  there  never  was  in  the 
history  of  the  world  such  a  relaxation,  such  a  dis- 
solution of  the  bands  of  society,  as  in  the  days  in 
which  the  apostle  wrote.  J^ero  on  the  throne  of 
the  Eoman  world !  The  old  noblesse,  who  had  at 
any  rate  some  traditions  of  liberal  rule  in  their 
homes  and  on  their  estates,  were  well-nigh  extir- 
pated ;  while  new  men,  flatterers,  panderers,  ad- 


The  Just  Master,  81 

yenturers  of  all  sorts,  were  exalted  to  the  higli 
places  in  their  room.  The  last  ounce  of  labour 
was  exacted  from  the  slaves,  and  the  last  grain  of 
corn  from  the  estate,  to  feed  the  lustful  luxury  of 
the  lord  in  the  metropolis.  The  world  has  never 
touched  such  a  sheer  depth  of  degradation,  so- 
ciety has  never  been  so  near  to  utter  dissolution, 
as  in  the  days  when  Paul  held  forth  a  divine  pat- 
tern of  all  human  relations,  and  preached  to  hus- 
bands and  wives,  fathers  and  children,  masters 
and  servants,  the  example  of  the  Husband,  the 
Father,  the  Master  in  heaven.  And  it  saved  so- 
ciety. The  men  who  got  their  eye  on  the  great 
example,  and  modelled  their  lives  as  husbands, 
fathers,  and  masters  on  the  Lord's,  who  set  the 
Lord  always  before  them,  and  found  strength  to 
do  justly  and  love  mercy  in  Him  who  is  just  and 
merciful  to  all,  began  to  reknit  the  bonds  of  so- 
ciety. They  held  together  what  was  falling  into 
ruin;  they  saved  the  world;  they  are  saving  it 
still.  The  number  of  men  and  women  who  are 
ruling  in  their  homes  with  the  fear  of  God  before 
their  eyes,  and  the  love  of  God  within  their  hearts, 
is  the  number  of  elect  ministers  whom  we  have 
for  the  sa\dng  of  our  nation,  and  ultimately  of  the 
yrorld. 

4* 


82  The  Home  Life. 

The  true  principle  of  the  whole  lies  here : — 
"  Knowing  that  ye  yourselves  have  a  Master  in 
heaven^  Deal  with  your  dependents  as  you 
would  that  the  Lord  should  deal  with  you.  "  Just 
and  equaiy  Alas!  it  is  hard  to  get  any  fair 
meaning  attached  to  the  terms.  The  man  who 
has  found  out  the  lowest  price  at  which  a  starving 
man  or  a  consumptive  woman  will  take  his  work, 
considers  that  he  has  found  the  fair  price.  The 
mistress  who  has  found  out  how  much  a  poor  do- 
mestic drudge  will  do  by  eighteen  hours  of  con- 
stant disorderly  toil,  considers  that  she  has  discov- 
ered the  fair  day's  work.  I  should  dwell  more  on 
the  fact  that  the  seiwants  here  spoken  of  were 
slaves,  and  therefore  peculiarly  cast  on  the  mas- 
ter's equitable  and  merciful  rule,  but  that  so  much 
of  our  labour  is  done  under  conditions  hardly  re- 
moved from  slavish,  that  the  distinction  would 
lack  difference  if  it  were  placed  in  too  prominent 
a  light.  The  slop-workwoman,  the  West  End 
milliner's  young  lady,  the  journeyman  baker,  the 
Dorsetshire  labourer,  might  look  longingly  at  the 
slave's  ease  and  plenty  in  many  a  great  household 
in  Rome.  It  is  a  dark  sad  subject,  the  conditions 
under  which  so  much  of  our  industrial  toil  is  car- 
ried on.     The  skilled  artizan  or  spinner  has  a  po^ 


The  Just  Master,  83 

sition  whose  comfort  many  a  liiglilj  educated 
drudge  in  superior  regions  might  envy ;  but  there 
are  whole  classes  of  our  countrymen  and  country- 
women whose  lot  shows  darkly  beside  the  slave's 
or  even  the  brute's. 

Yes,  but  this  master,  this  mistress,  have  them- 
selves a  Master  in  heaven,  able  to  deal  with  them 
as  they  deal  with  their  dependents,  and  if  needed, 
to  make  them  writhe  as  they  make  their  slaves. 
This  is  a  very  strong,  coarse  form  in  which  to  put 
it,  but  it  is  the  only  form  in  which  some  tyrants 
seem  able  to  understand  it ;  and  there  are  very 
terrible  sentences  to  be  found  in  the  word  of  God 
as  to  the  doom  of  those  who  persist  in  provoking 
the  stroke  of  the  Divine  hand.  But  after  all,  is 
He  not  a  name  or  a  shadow  ?  Who  is  the  Al- 
mighty? where  is  He?  Men  may  laugh — they 
have  laughed  in  all  ages — at  a  penalty  so  vague 
as  the  vengeance  of  the  Supreme.  And  then 
there  is  no  help.  Masters,  lords,  kings,  must  go 
on  tyrannising  until  the  maddened  victims  rise 
on  them,  and  tear  their  hearts  out  as  they  did 
once  in  Paris ;  and  then  when  they  are  quivering 
in  the  grasp  of  a  wild  devilish  mob,  they  may 
have  thoughts  in  that  last  moment  that  the  ven- 
geance of  an  unseen  God  is  not  a  matter  so  far 


84  The  Home  Life. 

off  as  they  had  supposed.  But  if  a  man  has  some 
dread  of  this  awful  Being,  and  some  conviction 
that  He  is  able  to  destroy  both  body  and  soul  in 
hell,  then  there  is  some  hold  of  him.  It  was  j)er- 
haps  the  main  hold  of  the  Mediaeval  Church.  It 
helps  us  to  understand  those  awful  pictures  of  the 
torments  of  the  damned,  which  preachers,  paint- 
ers, and  poets  brought  out  with  such  terrible  dis- 
tinctness throughout  the  middle  ages ;  and  which 
Dante  has  fixed  in  forms  which  will  live  in  men's 
imagination  while  the  world  endures.  One  can 
comprehend  how  the  dread  picture  of  an  Ezze- 
lino  or  a  JS'icholas  in  torment  might  help  poor, 
oppressed,  down-trodden  serfs  of  toil,  or  children 
of  peace,  to  hold  fast  some  faith  in  the  govern- 
ment of  a  righteous  God. 

But  we  rise  into  a  higher  region  when  men 
can  be  brought  to  believe  that  God  is  able  to  bless 
them  richly,  to  make  their  lives  glad  and  fruitful, 
in  the  measure  in  which  they  rain  blessings  on 
those  whom  He  has  placed  under  their  charge. 
Then  you  have  the  highest  assurance  that  the  rule 
will  have  a  sacred  sentiment  of  duty  in  the  heart 
of  it,  and  will  bless  doubly,  servant  and  master 
alike.  And  it  is  the  only  security.  History  de- 
livers to  us  no  record  of  a  successful  and  perma- 


The  Just  Master.  85 

nent  resistance  to  tyranny,  a  steady  development 
of  righteous  government,  except  nnder  the  influ- 
ence of  these  Christian  ideas.  And  here,  too,  is 
a  power,  if  it  can  be  brought  fully  to  bear,  which 
can  make  wise,  righteous,  and  merciful  rulers  out  of 
very  quiet,  common,  and  by  no  means  heroic  men 
and  women.  It  is  a  power  which  can  reach  all, 
and  has  the  same  influence,  the  same  message  for 
all,  for  the  most  absolute  monarch,  and  for  the 
poorest  housekeeper  who  has  but  one  drudge  to 
rule  over  in  her  own  home.  The  beginning  of 
all  good  rule,  of  all  fair  and  equal  dealing  with 
your  dependents,  is  the  sense  that  you  also  have  a 
Master  in  heaven ;  and  that  the  model  of  your 
method  with  them  is  the  method  of  God  with 
yourself.  Study  that  method,  and  imitate  it  as 
you  may. 

God  is  merciful,  but  not  weakly  kind.  Noth- 
ing so  demoralises  as  mere  kindness,  the  indispo- 
sition to  compel  effort,  and  to  look  on  pain. 
Love  in  the  heart,  command  in  the  voice,  strength 
in  the  hand, — ^these  are  the  endowments  of  the 
merciful  ruler.  Know  what  ought  to  be  done, 
and  have  it  done,  witji  stern  imperiousness  if 
needs  be,  but  always  with  the  remembrance  that 
the  servant  is  the  Lord's  servant  as  well  as  yours. 


86  The  Home  Life. 

and  that  an  appeal  lies  to  His  bar.  Let  tlie  mer- 
cy of  a  brother  sinner  temper  ever  your  demands 
and  judgments,  as  you  pray  that  God's  judgment 
may  be  tempered  to  you.  But  have  tbe  right 
thing  done,  as  God  will  have  the  right  thing  done 
by  you. 

He  calleth  us  not  servants,  but  friends.  There 
is  no  Christian  home  where  the  servant  is  not  the 
friend  as  well  as  the  servant, — where  something 
has  not  draAvn  forth  towards  the  master  his  own 
interest,  zeal,  and  hope.  Something,  I  say ;  but 
there  is  but  one  thing, — God's  method  with  us, 
and  that  is  intercourse,  sympathy,  and  love.  I 
believe  that  your  dependents  watch  far  more 
keenly  than  you  imagine  for  little  marks  of  confi- 
dence and  interest,  and  would  be  thankful  in  re- 
turn to  give  you  their  confidence,  and  cast  them- 
selves on  your  guidance,  if  they  recognised  in  you 
a  true  desire  and  power  to  draw  forth  their  trust. 
There  are  a  thousand  ways  in  the  close  intercourse 
of  daily  life  of  expressing  kindly  interest  and 
good  will,  and  of  enlisting  that  in  your  depend- 
ents which  no  gold  can  buy,  and  no  gold  can 
destroy.  *'  /  call  you  not  servants^  hut  friends^ 
But  God  sufiers  no  presumption  in  His  friends, 
no  idle  leaning  on  the  friendship,  no  mere  senti- 


The  Just  Master.  87 

mental  sjmpatliies ;  service  rendered  faithfully  to 
the  full  strain  is  the  bond  of  the  friendship,  and 
the  continual  strengthening  of  the  noblest  ener- 
gies of  the  nature  is  its  fruit.  God  surrounds  us 
with  a  vigilant,  but  unobtrusive  care;  never 
sleeping,  but  never  fretting;  never  tampering 
with  freedom,  but  never  too  carelessly  trusting 
it ;  guiding  by  the  eye  and  the  hand,  rather  than 
by  the  goad ;  winning  confidence,  rather  than  in- 
spiring terror;  bearing  much  and  long,  rather 
than  casting  off,  and  leaving  the  outcast  a  prey  to 
ever-vigilant  and  malignant  foes. 

"  Lite  as  a  father  pitieth  his  children,  so  the 
Lord  pitieth  them  that  fear  Him  /  for  He  Icnow- 
eth  our  frame,  He  remembereth  that  we  are  dustP 
There  is  a  tender  watchfulness  lest  the  workers 
grow  over  weary,  the  anxions  ones  over  sad.  He 
does  not  intrude  His  counsels  and  messages  on  all 
our  moods ;  we  are  left  to  fight  with  many  of  them 
as  we  may ;  but  He  never  suffers  us  to  forget  that 
He  is  not  far  from  us  in  our  dire  extremities ;  and 
that  when  heart  and  flesh  fail.  He  is  present  with 
His  aids.  And  I  have  known  a  wise,  kind  word 
or  deed,  in  some  moment  of  sickness  or  weariness 
which  none  but  a  watchful  and  loving  eye  would 
have  detected,  break  down  a  hard,  rebellious  na- 


88  The  Home  Life. 

ture,  and  turn  a  careless,  heartless  servant  into  a 
humble,  submissive,  devoted  friend. 

I  know  that  all  this  may  seem  very  dreamy 
and  Utopian  to  many  of  you.  Perhaps  you  have 
fairly  given  up  trying  to  be  kind  and  considerate 
to  subordinates:  the  more  kindness  you  show, 
the  more  licence  they  take,  and  the  more  trouble 
they  give  you  in  the  end.  Perhaps  so.  Will 
you  try  a  new  method?  Begin  with  yourself. 
Take  yourself  in  hand.  Bring  your  own  vain 
thoughts  and  stormy  tempers  into  subjection; 
work  the  spirit  and  the  mind  of  Christ  into  the 
texture .  of  your  own,  and  then  try  once  more. 
Or,  in  the  worst  case,  remember  that  Heaven 
might  say  the  same  of  you  and  me,  and  Heaven 
goes  on  helping  and  blessing  us  still. 

"  Then  came  Peter  to  Him^  and  said^  Lord^ 
how  oft  shall  my  hrother  sin  against  me^  and  I 
forgive  him?  till  seven  times?  Jesus  saith  unto 
him.^  I  say  not  unto  thee^  Until  seven  times:  hict^ 
Until  seventy  times  seven.  Therefore  is  the  Icing- 
dom  of  heaven  likened  unto  a  certain  hing,  which 
would  take  account  of  his  servants.  And  when  he 
had  hegun  to  reclton^  one  was  Irought  unto  him^ 
which  owed  him  ten  thousa/nd  talents.  £ut  foras- 
much as  he  had  not  to  pay,  his  lord  commamded 


The  Just  Master.  89 

Imn  to  he  sold^  and  his  wife^  and  children^  and  all 
that  he  had,  and pa.yment  to  he  made.  The  servant 
therefore  fell  down,  and  worshvpped  him,  saying, 
Lord,  have  patience  with  me,  and  I  will  pay  thee 
all.  Then  the  lord  of  that  servant  was  moved  with 
compassion,  and  loosed  him,  and  forgave  him  the 
debt.  But  tlie  same  servant  went  out,  and  found 
one  of  his  fellow-servants,  which  owed  him  an 
hundred  pence :  and  he  laid  hands  on  him,  and 
toolc  him  hy  the  throat,  saying.  Pay  me  that  thou 
owest.  And  his  fellow-servant  fell  down  at  his 
feet,  and  besought  him,  saying.  Save  patience  with 
me,  and  I  will  pay  thee  all.  And  he  would  not : 
but  went  and  cast  him  into  prison,  till  he  shoidd 
pay  the  debt.  So  when  his  fellow-servants  saio 
lohat  was  done,  they  were  very  sorry,  and  came 
and  told  imto  their  lord  all  that  was  done.  Then 
his  lord,  after  that  he  had  called  him,  said  unto 
him,  0  thou  wiclced  servant,  I  forgave  thee  all 
that  debt,  because  thou  desiredst  me:  shouldest 
not  thou  also  have  had  compassion  on  thy  fellow- 
servant,  even  as  I  had  pity  on  thee  f  And  his 
lord  was  loroth,  and  delivered  him  to  the  tor- 
onentors,  till  he  shoidd  pay  all  that  was  dtie  unto 
him.  So  lihewise  shall  my  heavenly  Father  do 
also  unto  you,  if  ye  from  your  hearts  forgive  not 


90  The  Home  Bfe. 

every  one  his  'brother  their  tresjpasses,^'^  (Matt, 
xviii.  21-35). 

I  believe  tliis.  I  dare  not  give  up  hope  and 
effort  for  any  man  with  these  words  before  me. 
Dare  you  ?  You  may  feel  sadly  enough  that  you 
have  reached  the  limit  of  your  powers ;  but  dare 
you,  with  that  sentence  ringing  in  your  ears,  say 
that  you  have  reached  the  limit  of  your  pity,  your 
mercy,  your  desire,  could  you  but  see  the  way,  to 
help  and  to  save?  Until  seventy  times  seven! 
until  numbers  end ;  and  then  the  fountain  of  all 
love  and  pity  is  unexhausted  still. 

Here  is  the  most  effectual  stimulus  to  unself- 
ish, unrewarded  thought  and  care  for  others  that 
earth  or  heaven  can  supply.  "When  Heaven  found 
it,  and  brought  it  to  bear  on  man,  then  began 
the  regeneration  of  society.  Much  of  the  work 
must  be  thankless,  and  mere  nature  finds  thank- 
less toil  intolerable.  Disappointed  you  must  be, 
disheartened  you  must  be ;  you  will  constantly  be 
tempted  to  say,  "  I  have  done  my  utmost  for  the 
thankless  fools, — I  have  shown  them  constant  and 
unselfish  kindness,  and  now  I  have  done.  They 
may  take  their  own  course,  and  go  to  wreck  and 
ruin  as  quickly  as  they  please."  Nay,  until  sev- 
enty TBiES  SEVEN !  And  "  knowing  that  ye  your- 
selves also  have  a  Master  in  heaven,"  who  has 


The  Just  Master.  91 

spent  infinitely  more  on  yon,  and  is  not  weary 
yet,  gather  np  yonr  strength  and  courage  for  an- 
other effort.  Granted  that  for  their  own  sakes 
they  have  no  claim  on  yon,  do  it  for  God's  sake ; 
His  claim  on  you  is  never  exhausted,  for  His  pa- 
tience and  goodness  never  tire.  We  shall  never 
dare  to  despair  of  our  fellow-servants  if  we  meas- 
m-e  the  patience  and  gentleness  of  God.  Christ 
stands  in  the  person  of  every  poor  suppliant, 
every  humble  dependent,  and  says,  "  This  is  the 
child  of  my  pity  ;  deal  with  him  as  thou  wouldst 
deal  with  thy  Lord  in  his  room." 

Rhapsody,  is  it?  Yague,  dreamy  notions, 
which  can  never  bring  any  practical  help  to  such 
a  world  as  this !  Yery  well ;  but  remember  that 
the  world  began  to  be  helped,  began  to  look  up 
and  live,  just  when  these  notions  were  brought 
into  it.  And  try  it  long  enough  on  any  other 
plan,  you  will  but  let  loose  the  wolves  of  greed 
and  revenge  to  torment  mankind.  To  me,  I  con- 
fess, the  longer  I  live  the  more  clearly  is  it  appar- 
ent, that  the  only  practical,  powerful  antagonist 
to  the  demons  of  selfishness  and  tyranny  which 
are  tearing  the  heart  out.  of  society,  is  the  exlior- 
tation  with  which  the  text  is  charged,  borne  in 
upon  us,  as  it  is,  by  the  life,  the  death,  and  the 
risen  life,  of  the  incarnate  Son  of  God. 


lY. 
THE  FAITHFUL  SEEYANT. 

"  SertanU^  obey  in  all  things  your  masters  according  to  the 
JlesJi ;  not  with  eye-service^  as  men-pleasers  ;  "but  in  sin- 
gleness of  hearty  fearing  God:  andj  whatsoe'cer  ye  do,  do 
it  heartily,  as  to  the  Lord,  and  not  unto  men.^^ — Col.  iii. 
22,  23. 

That  wliicli  is  mainly  wanted  in  liiiman  rela- 
tions, is  a  principle  wliicli  shall  lift  our  obliga- 
tions and  duties  to  each  other,  above  those  pertur- 
bations which  spring  out  of  our  personal  infirmi- 
ties,  follies,  and  sins.  Each  man  needs  a  rule  and 
a  motive  independent  of  that  variable  element, 
the  goodness  or  the  badness  of  the  brother  to 
whom  he  owes  a  duty.  In  truth,  we  only  rise  to 
a  true  human  dignity  when  our  supreme  motive 
and  regulative  power  has  its  organ  within ;  and 
when  the  question,  in  every  claim  which  is  made 
on  our  service,  is,  not  how  much  has  such  an  one 
the  power  to  exact  of  me,  but,  how  much  do  I 


The  Faithful  Servant.  93 

owe  it  to  myself,  as  in  the  sight  of  God,  to  do. 
It  is  as  needful  for  masters  as  for  servants.  How 
mncli  do  I  owe  it  to  God  to  do  for  my  seiwants,  is 
the  master's  question.  How  much  do  I  owe  it  to 
God  to  do  for  my  master,  is  the  servant's.  Till 
this  be  fairly  recognised  and  established  as  the 
Christian  principle  of  all  social  relations,  the 
"  tearing,  biting,  and  devouring  each  other,"  will 
go  on  to  the  end  of  time.  It  may  be  a  very  Uto- 
pian principle.  And  it  is  quite  possible,  too,  that 
it  may  have  been  much  more  easy  to  see  the  way 
to  the  application  of  it  in  the  good  old  times, 
when*  the  relations  of  both  home  and  business 
were  much  more  simple  and  limited  than  they 
can  be  considered  now. 

There  is  a  kind  of  feeling  in  the  minds  of 
those  who  do  not  care  to  look  the  reality  of  this 
Christian  obligation  very  fully  in  the  face,  that 
the  two  parties  are  now,  in  a  large  measure,  inde- 
pendent of  each  other,  and  tSat  each  must  con- 
tend for  its  interests  sternly,  doing  for  itself  just 
the  best  that  it  can.  Self-interest,  we  are  con- 
stantly told — though  there  is  a  higher  view  even 
of  self-interest  than  the  term  is  usually  held  to 
cover — must  in  the  business  world  rule  supreme. 
Yery  well ;  be  it  so.     But,  then,  let  us  shut  up 


■' 


94  The  Home  Life. 

our  New  Testament,  and  have  done  with  tlie  be- 
lief that  it  has  some  guidance  for  us  as  to  the  du- 
ties and  relations  of  life.  Is  it  possible  that  there 
is  a  great  world  of  human  thought  and  activity 
with  which  the  purest  principles  of  the  ISTew  Tes- 
tament have  little  or  nothing  to  do?  I  find  it 
impossible  to  believe  it.  Could  one  be  brought  to 
believe  it,  one  might  be  under  grievous  temptation 
to  shut  up  the  Bible,  and  see  what  Gotama  or 
Confucius  could  do  for  us  in  its  room.  I  live  in 
the  hope,  though  we  shall  none  of  us  see  it  ful- 
filled here,  that  Christ  and  the  angels  will  one 
day  look  down  upon  a  world  of  teeming  activity, 
invention,  and  production,  a  world  of  commerce, 
in  which  the  law  of  Christian  brotherly  life  shall 
reign  supreme ;  when  the  sentence,  "  Look  not 
every  man  on  his  own  things,  but  also  on  the 
things  of  others,"  shall  have  a  large  and  noble 
reading  in  the  statute-books  of  commerce  and  on 
the  exchanges  of  *^he  world.  The  Lord's  reign 
surely  will  not  dry  up  all  the  industry  ani  com- 
merce of  mankind.  And  far  as  we  may  be  from 
it  in  these  struggling  days,  and  hard  as  it  may 
seem  to  work  toward  it,  in  the  terribly  compli- 
cated and  difficult  times  in  which  we  live,  do  not! 
let  us  give  up  the  hope  and  the  vision  of  it.     And 


The  Faithful  Servant.  95 

if,  in  working  toward  it,  however  feebly,  fortunes 
lose  something  of  their  colossal  proportions,  we 
shall  find  ourselves  rich.er  in  honour  and  love,  and 
eternal  gainers  by  the  exchange. 

To  me  there  is  something  terrible  in  the  vis- 
ion of  the  constant  strife  and  jealousy  of  the 
classes.  If  the  world  is  to  be  always  fighting  this 
battle — the  victims  of  which,  in  the  sickly  bodies 
and  the  stunted  souls  which  poverty  is  ever  send- 
ing forth  into  the  world's  highways,  dot  our  fields 
and  throng  our  streets — then  we  may  all  come  to 
share  the  conviction  of  an  accomplished  German 
professor,  that  the  gospel  must  b^  given  up  as  a 
failure,  inasmuch  as  it  has  utterly  broken  its 
promise  of  peace  and  good- will  to  the  world.  If 
this  state  of  things  contents  you,  if  it  appears^ 
very  natural,  and  on  the  whole  inevitable,  that 
society  should  be  drawn  out  into  this  interminable 
array,  filling  the  air  with  its  battle-cries  and  the 
earth  with  its  slain,  then  the  whole  gospel  must 
seem  to  you  a  Utopian  vision,  and  Christ  the 
great  dreamer  of  the  world.  But  if  you  watch 
the  strife  sadly,  and  yearn  to  see  it  healed,  you 
will  throw  daily  fresh  emphasis  into  the  prayer, 
that  men  may  seek  both  the  motive  and  the  law 
of  their  duties  to  each  other,  not  in  the  vain,  in- 


96  The  Home  Life. 

constant  creature,  but  in  tlie  constant,  eternal 
God.  This  is  tlie  help  which  Heaven  brings  to 
us  in  our  business  and  in  every  sphere :  "  What- 
soever ye  do,  do  it  heartily,  as  unto  the  Lord,  and 
not  unto  vnenP  Somehow — ^liow  we  cannot  tell, 
but  somehow — this  help  of  Heaven  will  be  made 
effectual,  and  commerce,  too,  wiU  be  saved. 

Our  present  concern  is  with  the  servant's  duty ; 
the  master's  has  akeady  passed  under  review. 

I.  Understand  that  to  serve  w^ell  is  in  its  way 
quite  as  noble  and  even  as  grand  a  thing  as  to 
rule^perhaps  ^nobler.  Obedience  and  patience 
are  the  choice  virtues  in  the  estimation  of  Heaven. 
Obedience  was  one  grand  lesson  of  the  Saviour's 
^  life.  "  /  am  among  you  as  one  that  serveth^ 
There  have  been  those,  and  not  the  weakest  and 
most  ignoble  of  our  race,  who  have  made  them- 
selves servants — not  sentimental  servants,  but  ser- 
vants in  a  real,  hard  sense — ^that  they  might  be 
more  like  Hm.  During  the  early  and  middle 
ages,  when  the  life  of  Christ  had  a  sort  of  mag- 
netic attraction,  men  were  possessed  with  a  per- 
fect frenzy  of  obedience.  They  put  themselves 
under  superiors,  they  prayed  to  be  ruled — ay,  even 
with  hard  and  stem  command :  they  sought  ea- 


J 


The  Faithful  Sei^ant  97 

gerly  tlie  most  menial  offices  and  tasks,  that  they 
might  tread  more  closely  in  the  footsteps  of  Him, 
who  came  in  the  form  of  a  servant,  "  not  that  He 
might  he  ministered  unto^  hut  that  He  might  min- 
ister^ and  give  His  life  a  ransom  for  manyP 
Voluntary  humility^  Paul  calls  it;  and  men 
sought  it  with  passionate  eagerness.  But  the  re- 
lations and  obligations  which  we  make  for  our- 
selves have  no  blessing  for  us  compared  with  those 
which  are  made  of  God.  The  obedience  which 
was  exacted  and  paid  in  monasteries,  and  under 
the  rule  of  chivalry,  had  one  great  vice — it  was 
unnatural.  God  did  not  ask  it  of  men,  God  did 
not  bless  it.  He  has  made  room  enough  for  obe- 
dience in  the  round  of  our  common  Hves. 

"  The  trivial  round,  the  common  task, 
Will  furnish  all  we  ought  to  ask ; 
Eoom  to  deny  ourselves,  a  road 
To  bring  us  daily  nearer  God." 

But  it  may  exalt  our  sense  of  the  dignity  of  obe- 
dience, to  learn  that  some  of  the  noblest  of  men 
have  voluntarily  and  joyfully  sought  it,  and  have 
felt  that  they  were  liker  Christ  and  nearer  heaven 
in  obeying  humbly  and  from  the  heart  some 
hard  and  even  unjust  commandment,  than  in 
5 


98  The  Borne  Life. 

giving  rein  to  tlie  pride  of  power  in  swaying  tlie 
movements  of  subject  multitudes  from  a  throne. 
There  is  only  one  noble  conquest — self-conquest. 
Servants  have  a  grand  opportunity  to  win  it. 
"  Cheater  is  he  that  ruleth  his  spirit^  than  he  that 
taheth  a  city^'^  Some  of  earth's  greatest,  by  this 
rule,  must  be  among  them  that  serve.  And  do 
not  rebel  at  the  meanness  of  your  service,  if  mean 
it  seem.  They  were  slaves  to  whom  Paul  wrote 
these  words:  men  and  women,  boys  and  girls, 
bought  and  sold  like  cattle,  and  kept  close  to  their 
tasks  by  curses  *knd  blows.  You  know  no  tasks 
so  hard,  so  bitter,  as  those  which  the  apostle 
taught  them  thus  to  elevate  into  a  noble  form  of 
divine  service,  as  comrades  of  apostles  and  proph- 
ets, and  of  Gabriel,  the  servant  who  stands  before 
the  throne.  Refuse  to  think  meanly  of  any  office 
to  which  the  Master  calls  you ;  despise  your  post, 
and  you  will  soon  degrade  your  work.  Magnify 
your  office  by  diligent,  faithful,  self-respectful  ser- 
vice ;  you  will  pass  up  one  day  to  stand  among 
the  kings. 

II.  Remember  that  the  measure  and  spirit  of 
your  service  is  not  a  question  between  you  and 
your  masters,  but  between  you  and  your  God. 


The  Faithful  Servant.  99 

God  meant  that  there  should  he  good  rule  and 
good  service  upon  earth ;  good  command  and  good 
ohedience.  Things  can  only  go  on  happily  and 
prosperously  when  duties  to  God  on  hoth  sides  are 
fulfilled.  A  good  master  kindles  a  spirit  of  loyal 
obedience  which  makes  service  a  delight;  none 
grudge  toils  and  sacrifices  for  those  whom  they 
honour  and  love.  But  you  are  not  dependent  on 
good  masters.  The  law  of  your  life's  duty, is  not 
dependent  on  anything  so  shifting  and  uncertain 
as  the  actions  of  a  man.  That  is  a  poor  life,  a 
base- life,  which  is  carried  on  by  "  eye-service  as 
men-pleasers ; "  a  life  that  waits  on  man,  sinks  it- 
self to  the  level  of  a  brute's.  Man  is  a  god  to  the 
dumb  brutes,  his  satellites,;  "  hut  one  is  your  Mas- 
ter, mechanics,  labourers,  servants,  drudges,  shoe- 
blacks— "  one  is  your  Master,  even  Christ,  and  all 
ye  are  brethren  y  "  brethren  in  equality  of  service 
to  your  heavenly  King.  These  are  not  brave 
words  only ;  they  are  simple,  hard,  literal  facts. 
The  man  who  serves  for  Christ's  sake  in  the 
world's  service,  whatsoever  his  task  may  be,  is  the 
equal  before  Christ  of  the  world's  princes  and 
kings.  ISTot  that  he  will  be  strong  on  theories  of 
equality.  Christ's  true  servants  are  weak  in  theo- 
ries, but  strong  in  work;  slow  to  assert  rights, 


100  The  Home  Life. 

swift  to  fulfil  duties ;  poor  in  pretension,  rich  in 
power.  They  read  such  words  as  these  with  rev- 
erence, and  a  tenderness  which  abases  pride : — 
"  Nmjo  hefore  the  feast  of  the  jpassover^  when  Jesus 
Ttnew  that  His  hour  was  come  that  He  should  de- 
jpart  out  of  this  world  unto  the  Father,  having 
loved  His  own  which  were  in  the  world,  He  loved 
them  unto  the  end.  And  supper  heing  ended,  the 
devil  having  now  put  into  the  'heart  of  Judas  Is- 
cariot,  Simon^s  son,  to  hetray  Him  ;  Jesus  know- 
ing that  the  Father  had  given  all  things  into  His 
hands,  and  that  He  was  come  from  God  and  went 
to  God  /  He  riseth  from  supper,  and  laid  aside 
His  garments ;  and  tooh  a  towel,  and  girded 
Himself.  After  that  He  poureth  water  into  a 
hasin,  and  began  to  wash  the  disciples'^  fo^^j  ^^^  ^ 
wipe  them  with  the  towel  wherewith  He  was 
girded.  .  ...  So  after  He  had  washed  their  feet, 
and  had  taken  His  garments,  and  was  set  down 
again.  He  said  unto  them.  Know  ye  what  I  have 
done  to  you  f  Ye  call  me  Master  and  Lord :  and 
ye  say  well  /  for  so  L  am.  Lf  I  then,  your  Lord 
and  Master,  have  washed  your  feet ;  ye  also  ought 
to  wash  one  another'' s  feet.  For  L  have  given  you 
an  example,  that  ye  should  do  as  I  have  done  to 
you.     Ycrily,  verily,  L  say  unto  you,  Tlie  servant 


The  Faithful  Sermnt  101 

is  not  greater  than  his  lord  /  neither  he  that  is 
sent  greater  than  he  that  sent  him.  If  ye  Jc7iow 
these  things,  happy  are  ye  if  ye  do  themP 

Sucli  are  readier  to  serve  tlie  servants,  than 
to  claim  equality  with  the  lords  of  this  world. 
'^  Servus  servorum  DeV^  meant  something  on 
the  First  Gregory's  lips.  Bnt  this  waiting  on 
Christ  for  the  law  and  the  life  of  your  service 
gives  a  fixed  and  noble  principle  to  obedience, 
and  inspires  it.  Tou  may  reckon  on  faithful  and 
entire  service  from  the  man  or  woman  whose  eye 
discerns  the  Master  while  waiting  upon  you. 
Masters  may  be  froward  and  fretful,  unjust  and 
hard,  careless  of  your  burdens,  thankless  for  your 
pains.  I^ever  mind.  ITot  with  them  is  your  ac- 
count. Their  smile  or  good  word  would  gladden 
you,  and  make  your  service  the  sweeter ;  but  you 
are  not  serving  for  it.  There  is  a  gladder  smile 
which  is  always  raining  its  light  upon  you,  a  good 
word  which  carries  a  larger  benediction  in  its 
train.  * 

Christ  recognises  no  plea  for  poor  and  heart- 
less service  on  the  ground  of  the  selfishness  or 
incompetence  of, masters.  '•'Thou  wicked  and 
slothful  servant^''  will  be  the  greeting  of  all  who 
think  to  justify  a  slovenly  service  by  such  a  plea 


102  The  Borne  Life. 

at  the  last  great  day.     "WTien  He  fails  to  gladden 
you  witli  His  smile  or  strengthen  you  with  His 
good  word ;  when  you  pray  to  Him  for  strength 
to  do  some  thankless  duty,  and  find  it  harder  to 
do  it  through  your  prayer ;  when  something  very 
deep  within  you  says,  "  ill-done,"  instead  of  "  well- 
done,"   after  you  have   wrought   faithfully   and 
taken  little  of  this  world's  good  for  your  pains ; 
then  work  as"  dully  as  you  please,  there  is  no 
being  in  the  universe  who  has  the  right  to  call 
you  to  account.      But  while  His  eye  is  on  you, 
and  His  hand  sustains,  and  His  promise  stands, 
"  of  the  Lord  ye  ^Tiall  receive  the  reward  of  the 
inheritance,^'^ — work  ;  ay,  work  to  the  top  strain. 
Let  your  soul  go  into  it  as  well  as  your  muscles — 
indeed  your  muscles  will  never  go  into  it  thor- 
oughly unless  your  soul  di'ives  them.     Lay  on  to 
your  work  with  a  will,  men,  for  One  on  high  is 
watching  your  labours,  who  knows  from  within 
the  pressure  of  a  workman's  lot,  and  who  will 
lift  that  worlhnan  whom  diligence  and  fidelity 
have  made  worthy  of  His  fellowship,  to  His  right 
hand  on  His  throne  in  heaven.     Hear  Peter's  ex- 
hortation : — "  Servants,  'be  subject  to  your  masters 
with  all  fear  /  not  only  to  the  good  and  gentle,  but 
also  to  the  froward.     For  this  is  thankworthy,  if 


The  Faithful  Servant.  103 

a  moM  far  conscience  toward  God  endure  grief 
suffering  wrongfully.  For  what  glory  is  it,  if 
when  ye  he  huffeted  for  your  faults,  ye  tahe  it  pa- 
tiently f  hut  if  when  ye  do  well,  and  suffer  for  it, 
ye  take  it  patiently,  this  is  acceptable  with  God. 
For  even  hereunto  were  ye  called :  hecause  Christ 
also  suffered  for  us,  leaving  us  an  example,  that  ye 
shotdd  follow  His  steps :  who  did  no  sin,  neither 
was  guile  found  in  His  mouth  j  who,  when  He 
was  reviled,  reviled  not  again  /  when  He  suffered. 
He  threatened  not ;  hut  committed  Himself  to  Him 
that  judgeth  righteously :  who  His  own  self  hare 
our  sins  in  His  own  hody  on  the  i^ree,  that  we,  heing 
dead  to  sins,  should  live  unto  righteousness :  hy 
whose  stripes  ye  were  healed.  For  ye  were  as 
sheep  going  astray  /  hut  a/re  now  returned  unto 
tlie  Shepherd  and  Bishop  of  your  souls.^^  (1 
Peter  ii.  18-25.) 

But  it  must  be  recognised  in  all  fairness,  that 
tlie  conditions  of  modern  service  are  essentially 
different  from  tlie  ancient;  and  the  principle, 
though  substantially  the  same  under  all  forms  of 
service,  needs  to  be  wisely  and  temperately  ap- 
plied. To  the  servants  to  whom  Peter  wrote,  the 
question,  "  how  far  am  I  to  obey  an  unjust  com- 
mand?" was  hardly   a  practical  one.      Slaves, 


104:  The  Borne  Life, 

bound  hand  and  foot,  whom  their  masters  could 
torment  into  obedience  at  pleasure,  had  no  refuge, 
no  escape.  Whatever  the  command  might  be,  to 
try  to  obey  it  was  their  only  course  of  wisdom ; 
and  their  power  to  obey  it  would  be  grandly  reen- 
forced  by  such  an  exhortation,  above  all,  by  such 
an  example  as  this.  But  in  the  case  of  servants 
hired  by  free  contract  for  wages,  the  matter  is 
widely  different,  and  none  are  called  to  martyr 
themselves  beyond  a  certain  point  in  fulfilling  a 
hard  and  thankless  duty,  if  they  can  obtain  other 
and  more  congenial  employment.  But  none  can 
shut  their  eyes  to  the  fact,  that  this  feeling  of  duty 
to  the  Highest  will  help  patience  iand  strengthen 
endurance,  and  will  lead  an  earnest  and  self-re- 
spectful servant  to  hold  on  to  the  very  utmost  be- 
fore saying,  "  I  have  come  to  the  end  of  my  pa- 
tience, I  must  seek  my  fortune  elsewhere."  The 
service  whose  inspiration  is  a  morsel  of  bread  or 
a  man's  favour,  unless  God's  goes  with  it,  will  jib 
at  the  slightest  hill  of  difficulty,  and  refuse  the 
collar  at  the  first  touch  that  galls.  But  it  is  a 
base  service,  and  can  do  no  other  than  basely ; 
while  the  man  who  feels  that  the  supreme  ques- 
tion is,  "  what  does  my  Master  there  expect,  and 
demand  of  me  ? "  lifts  his  service  to  the  level  of 


The  Faithful  Servant.  105 

an  apostle's ;  lie  will  not  be  drawn  from  Ms  tasks 
by  slight  discomforts,  nor  make  bis  own  commod- 
ity tbe  one  regulating  principle  of  bis  life.  Ser- 
vants, make  yourselves  as  independent  as  your 
masters,  by  serving  in  all  your  service  "  with  con- 
science toward  God^  your  one  true  Master  in 
heaven. 

III.  Make  it  your  earnest  endeavour  to  be 
worth  a  "  double  hired  servant "  to  your  master, 
for  this  is  "  profitable  both  for  him  and  thee." 

I  know  that  this  may  seem  unsound  doctrine 
in  the  eyes  of  servants  and  work-people ;  just  as 
in  tracing  bad  service  mainly  to  bad  mastership, 
I  might  easily  seem  to  preach  unsound  doctrine 
to  the  class  which  I  then  addressed.  I  have  said 
something  of  what  I  thought  of  the  great  tribe 
of  masters,  who  throughout  England  compel  the 
troops  of  labourers  who  till  their  fields  to  feed 
like  pigs,  and  herd  like  brutes.  There  is  one 
other  thing  which  is  as  hateful  in  the  sight  of 
God  and  man,  and  as  noxious  to  the  highest  in- 
terest of  society ;  and  that  is  a  sight  which  may 
be  seen  any  day  where  work  is  in  hand : — a  strong, 
stout  labourer  dawdling  over  his  task  as  a  sick 
man  with  a  spark  of  spirit  in  him  would  be 
5* 


106  The  Horns.  Life. 

asliamed  to  dawdle ;  laying  a  brick  daintily  here 
and  another  daintily  there,  and  then  stopping  to 
look  at  it,  and  have  a  chat  with  his  mate  before 
he  lays  another.  And  if  the  foreman,  who  has  a 
duty  to  his  employer,  ventures  to  remonstrate, 
straightway  he  strikes  work,  and  carries  his  base, 
worthless  labour  to  the  next  market,  where  they 
will  endure  his  sluggard  ways.  This  to  a  thought- 
ful eye  is  one  of  the  saddest  sights  to  be  seen  un- 
der the  sun. 

ITot  that  on  the  ground  on  which  masters  now 
elect  to  stand,  the  balancing-point  of  pure  self-in- 
terest on  both  sides,  I  can  see  any  principle  upon 
which  it  can  be  fairly  condemned, — that  is,  con- 
demned in  accordance  with  the  principles  of  ac- 
tion which  are  laid  down  by  the  other  side.  I 
suppose  that  the  squire  who  pays  his  labourers 
eight  shillings  a  week,  has  a  valid  plea  before  the 
tribunal  of  political  economy,  in  the  fact  that  he 
can  get  any  amount  of  regular  labour  at  that 
price,  and  why  should  he  pay  more  ?  And  if  the 
fc workman  answers  the  employer's  complaint,  "  My 
strength  is  my  bread  and  my  children's  bread ; 
why  should  I  not  husband  it  to  the  utmost,  and 
spend  as  little  as  possible  at  such  a  price  % "  I 
do  not  see  my  way,  on  the  economical  ground,  to 


The  Faithful  Sermnt'  107 

a  thoroughly  satisfactory  answer.  I  can  see,  I 
think,  God's  answer,  as  we  may  gather  it  from 
His  Word ;  but  I  cannot  see  the  world's,  on  the 
level  to  which  it  is  content  to  lower  itself.  On 
that  level,  master  and  workman  must  just  be  left 
to  fight  it  out  as  they  can,  and  the  weakest  in  the 
end  must  give  in.  Paul  might  have  answered  the 
workman's  question,  why  should  I  put  more 
strength  than  I  can  help  into  my  work?  with 
some  stirring  words : — "  Work,  man,  because 
God  made  you  to  work;  because  work  will  be 
a  blessing  to  your  body,  mind,  and  spirit ;  and 
because  such  work  well  done  fits  you  for  nobler 
work  in  time.  Lay  these  bricks  with  a  will,  and 
you  will  be  laying  nobler  stones  one  day,  even 
the  stones  of  the  eternal  palace,  which  God  is 
building  to  be  the  heavenly  home  of  truth,  right- 
eousness, and  love." 

And  there  is  many  a  workman  in  every  gang 
who  feels  this,  and  has  as  little  sympathy  as  any 
of  us  with  the  sluggard  and  knave;  who  likes 
work  for  its  own  sake,  enjoys  it  most  when  he 
puts  most  will  into  it,  and  would  gladly  lay  his 
bricks  at  double  the  rate  if  he  dared.  If  he  dared ! 
And  who  is  to  hinder  him  ?  "  Verily,  a  man's 
foes  shaU  he  they  of  his  own  household P    It  is 


108  •      The  Home  Life. 

the  man  who  works  next  him  of  whom  he  is 
afraid.  If  he  shows  the  least  diligence  he  will 
report  him,  and  he  will  have  a  black  mark  put 
against  his  name,  because  he  is  making  it  harder 
for  the  lazy  ones  to  live.  The  sons  of  industry 
afraid  of  industry,  lest  lazy  worthless  loons  should 
be  forced  to  work  or  starve !  O  men !  things 
have  come  near  their  end  when  ye  organise  idle- 
ness, and  make  it  your  god.  The  most  blighting 
of  all  tyrannies  is  that  which,  proscribes  the  in- 
dustry and  energy  of  man.  There  is  no  curse 
which  can  be  laid  upon  a  man  so  deadly  as  that 
which  cripples  his  work ;  and  that  is  the  curse 
which  you  suffer  your  fellow-workmen  to  brand 
on  you. 

The  first  step  on,  is  for  workmen  of  independ- 
ent spirit  to  resolve  that  they  wall  break  it.  I 
know  well  that  the  question  is  not  so  simple  as 
appears.  The  workmen  say  that  they  must  give 
up  their  liberty  as  the  condition  of  their  organisa- 
tion; and  that  nothing  but  their  close  organisa-' 
tion,  and  the  pressure  which  by  their  unity  they 
can  bring  to  bear,  gives  them  a  chance  of  success 
in  the  great  struggle  of  their  lives.  This  is  not 
the  place  to  discuss  how  far  this  close  organisa- 
tion on  one  side  has  led  to  as  close  organisation 


The  Faithful  Servant,  109 

on  tlie  other ;  nor  to  inquire  which,  in  the  shock 
of  the  associations,  that  of  the  masters  and  that 
of  the  workmen,  is  likely  in  the  long  run  to  win. 
But  I  imagine  that  there  is  little  doubt  that  the 
success  of  general  lock-outs,  has  led  the  thought- 
ful leaders  of  the  working  men  to  think  more 
cautiously  of  the  policy  of  turn-outs ;  and  has  pre- 
pared the  way  for  the  breaking  up  of  a  system 
which  has  exercised  a  very  positive  and  even  ter- 
rible tyranny,  for  the  sake  of  a  very  questionable 
good. 

But  after  all,  in  this  sphere,  as  in  every  other 
sphere,  what  we  want  is  men — ^men  of  independ- 
ent thought  and  power  of  action,  who  are  able  to 
lift  up  their  heads  against  the  despotism  of  the 
mob.  And  whence  is  the  help  of  such  to  come  % 
Many  subordinate  considerations  may  bring  help 
to  such  a  man.  A  man's  manly  spirit;  his  sense 
of  his  right  to  do  what  he  will  with  his  own,  and 
notably  with  his  own  muscle,  nerve,  and  will; 
his  duty  to  his  household,  which  is  constantly 
made  to  suffer  bitterly  through  the  tyranny  of  his 
class,  which  he  lacks  courage  to  defy; — ^these 
may  all  stir  him  to  long  for  freedom.  But  there 
is  one  grand  conquering  motive  which  will  sus- 
tain him  in  this  strife   against  those  who   are 


110  The  Home  Life. 

closest  to  him  in  liis  daily  life,  as  it  has  sustained 
millions;  and  that  is  the  supreme  sense  of  the 
duty  which  he  owes  to  his  one  Master  who  is  in 
heaven.  Set  Christ  before  you  as  the  Master  who 
claims  yom'  energetic  work,  who  demands  of 
right  that,  whatever  you  do,  you  shall  do  it  heart- 
ily, as  to  the  Lord,  and  not  unto  men,  and  it  will 
dehver  you  from  all  tyrannies,  whether  of  masters 
or  workmen.  You  wdll  wprk  then  only  where  you 
can  work  heartily ;  and  it  is  hard  to  believe  that 
a  workman,  who  only  wants  to  do  his  work  thor- 
oughly, will  be  left  to  starve  in  such  a  world  as 
this.  Still  there  are  things  which  a  man  must  be 
ready  to  starve  rather  than  be  guilty  of,  and 
amongst  them  we  must  reckon  dawdling  thi^ough 
life. 

The  man  who  enters  into  the  mind  of  the  apos- 
tle, and  works  as  the  Lord's  servant,  becomes 
worth  "  a  double  hired  servant "  to  his  master. 
There  are  some  things — and  wise  employers 
chiefly  value  these — which  cannot  be  bought  for 
gold.  No  wages  can  buy  that  vigilance,  that  con- 
stant, untiring  devotion  to  the  master's  interests, 
which  a  servant  who  loves  the  family,  and  the 
family  life,  and  is  counted  and  treated  as  an  inte- 
gral part  of  it,  will  display.     You  get  some  no- 


The^  Faithful  Servcmt  111 

tion  there  of  tlie  "  brother's  service,"  which,  the 
Hebrew  lawgiver  estimated  so  highly.  And  every 
servant  and  labourer  should  aim  at  it;  for  the 
true  dignity  and  honour  of  labour  is  the  respect, 
the  consideration,  the  love,  which  loyal  and  faith- 
ful service  never  fails  to  win.  There  is  no  more 
beautiful  and  honourable  relation  upon  earth  than 
that  of  the  old,  faithful,  incorruptible  servant,  to 
the  master  or  the  firm,  in  whose  service  he  has 
spent  the  strength  of  his  days.  Earth  holds  no 
more  honourable  men  and  women  than  these,  who 
have  made  a  master's  interest  their  own  through 
a  long  life  of  service,  have  sounded  the  depths  of 
the  virtue  of  obedience,  and  honoured  the  station 
in  which  they  were  set  by  the  Lord.  These  are 
the  aristocrats,  the  elect,  of  labour;  and  to  be 
among  the  elect  is  a  pure  object  of  ambition  in 
any  school.  Resolve  to  win  a  place  in  the  illus- 
trious band.  Be  worth  a  double  hired  servant  to 
your  master,  by  a  diligence  that  never  flags,  and 
a  trustiness  that  never  falters ;  it  will  plant  your 
foot  firmly  on  the  rungs  of  the  ladder  of  divine 
promotion.  The  man  who  can  serve  thus  for  the 
Lord's  sake  will  rule  one  day  in  the  kingdom  of 
God. 

And  did  masters  care  to  attach  their  workmen 


112  The  Home  Life. 

by  the  cords  of  love  and  tlie  bands  of  a  man,  we 
ebould  have  more  of  such  about  the  world.  "  I 
have  worked  many  a  long  year  for  my  master," 
said  a  poor  workman  once ;  "  and  I  have  had 
child  after  child  born,  but  he  has  never  once  asked 
after  my  wife  or  children."  A  city  missionary 
of  large  experience  went  into  a  sick  workman's 
room,  and  saw  the  master  sitting  by  the  sick 
man's  bedside.  "  You  have  done  my  heart  good, 
sir,  at  any  rate,"  said  the  missionary ;  "  I  have 
been  many  years  in  the  mission,  but  I  never  be- 
fore saw  such  a  sight  as  this."  These  are  the 
bands  that  knit  brother  to  brother,  and  make  a 
brother  workman,  with  a  soul  awake  for  your  ser- 
vice, as  well  as  a  hand,  worth  a  double  hired  ser- 
vant in  your  business  or  your  home.  Masters, 
make  it  your  ambition  to  win  this  service.  Ser- 
vants, make  it  your  aim  to  live  it.  It  will  be  the 
crown  of  your  labour,  and  will  outshine  one  day 
all  conquerors'  crowns. 

lY.  Endeavour  to  carry  the  same  independ- 
ent, self-respectful  spirit  through  all  the  minor  ar- 
rangements of  your  life. 

I  want  you  to  respect  your  vocation  and  its 
duties  too  much  to  let  them  be  dependent  on  a 


TU  Faithful  Servant  113 

man's  whims,  frowns,  or  smiles.  I  want  you  to 
respect  them  too  much  to  trifle  or  dawdle  through 
them ;  rather  make  them  the  means  of  drawing 
forth  and  educating  your  manliest  powers.  And 
when  yom^  work  is  done,  and  the  wage  is  in  your 
hand,  I  pray  you  to  honour  the  fruit  of  your  life's 
work  too  much  to  guzzle  it  away  at  the  gin-shop, 
or  to  squander  it  on  those  tawdry  bits  of  finery  in 
which  silly  women  take  the  same  delight  that  silly 
men  do  in  drams.  Do  not  let  the  chief  fruit  of 
the  toil  which  God  honours  as  He  honours  no  con- 
queror's work,  run  down  the  sink  of  a  dram-shop. 
Do  not  despise  it  so  utterly,  do  not  put  it  to  such 
shameful  shame.  One  of  the  saddest  things  in 
om-  social  condition — yes,  I  think,  the  very  sad- 
dest— is  the  fact,  that  it  is  constantly  proved  that 
skilled  labourers,  who  earn  ample  wages,  are  the 
most  reckless  drinkers,  and  keep  thej^'  families  in 
most  miserable  ignorance  and  want.  In  fact, 
they  earn  too  much  money,  more  than  they  care 
or  know  how  to  spend  intelligently.  Instead  of  a 
nice,  tidy,  cheerful  little  house,  with  its  bit  of  gar- 
den, its  comfortable  parlour,  and  all  the  means  of 
bringing  up  a  family  so  as  to  set  them  on  respect- 
ably in  life,  and  put  the  chance  of  wealth  and  in- 
fluence within  their  reach,  they  are  content  to 


h 


114  The  Home  Life. 

muddle  on  in  a  wi'etclied  hovel,  whicli  a  hodman 
might  grumble  at  for  a  lodging.  They  let  the 
poor  wife  slave,  and  the  children  roll  and  fight  in 
the  gutters,  while  they  swill  down  their  hardly- 
earned  wages  at  the  beer-shop,  or  every  few  weeks 
disappear.  Heaven  knows  where,  "  on  the  spree." 
As  a  rule,  it  is  not  the  poorest  that  are  the  hard- 
est drinkers ;  it  is  the  skilled  workman,  the  man 
who  might  make  his  labour  the  basis  of  as  hon- 
ourable and  beautiful  a  home  life  as  any  that  is 

lived  in  England — that  is  in  the  world. 

• 

What  large  employer  of  labour,  observant  of 
the  habits  and  careful  of  the  well-being  of  his 
work-people,  is  not  constantly  filled  with  sadness 
by  observing  that  his  cleverest  hands  are  among 
the  most  irregular  and  unreliable ;  that  these  are 
the  men  who,  like  Esau,  systematically  despise 
their  birthright,  selling  it,  not  for  a  mess  of  pot- 
tage, but  for  a  mess  which  Esau's  hunting  dogs 
would  have  refused.  Such  men  need  no  Eeform 
Bill  to  give  them  votes ;  the  votes  are  there  ready 
to  their  hand.  They  have  but  to  provide  for  their 
households  the  comforts  and  conveniences  which 
tlieir  earnings  will  afford,  as»  well,  if  not  better 
than,  those  of  any  other  large  class  of  the  com- 
munity, and  they  will  be  at  once  far  above  the 


The  Faithful  Servant,  115 

minimum  francMse  in  even  a  moderate  scheme  of 
reform. 

Handle  your 'wages,  then,  as  you  handle  your 
work,  earnestly,  with  a  sense  of  how  much  is 
hanging  on  it.  That  lad  there,  when  he  takes  his 
place  one  day  among  the  masters,  perhaps  among 
the  M.P.'s,  will  be  blessing  you  for  every  penny 
you  brought  home  to  spend  on  his  schooling ;  and 
you,  too,  may  be  watching  it  and  blessing  God 
for  it,  here  or  on  high.  Don't  rob  him,  and  don't 
rob  that  brave,  patient,  hard-working  wife.  Don't 
be  guilty  before  Heaven  of  the  basest,  the  most 
brutal,  the  most  damnable  of  all  robberies — the 
robbery  of  a  home.  This  is  the  worst  sacrilege, 
nay,  it  is  the  only  true  sacrilege ;  for  I  don't  sup- 
pose that  the  bricks  and  mortar  of  our  churches, 
and  our  holy  vestments,  go  for  much  in  the  esti- 
mation of  Heaven. 

And  you,  servants,  respect  your  work,  and 
your  honourable  name  as  servants,  too  much  to  be 
mimicking  your  masters  and  mistresses  in  dress 
and  manner.  You  are  not  mistaken  for  fine  la- 
dies, believe  me.  I^or  are  you,  shopmen,  when 
I  you  indulge  in  Sunday  rings  and  jewellery,  and 
adopt  a  would-be  fashionable  swagger,  mistaken 
for  the  sons  of  peers.     You  lose  the  one  honour,  * 


116  The  Home  Life, 

the  real  honour,  which  diligence  and  fidelity  win, 
and  which  set  on  the  honest  brow  a  broad  seal 
which  has  never  been  forged ;  but  yon  do  not  win 
the  other.  Men  and  women  see  through  the  dis- 
guise in  a  moment,  and  laugh  at  it.  If  would-be 
fine  gentlemen  did  but  hear  the  pitiless  laugh 
with  which  their  strutting  pretension  is  greeted 
as  they  pass  by,  they  would  rush  home  to  hide 
themselves,  nay,  let  us  say,  rather  to  find  them- 
selves ;  and  to  don  the  modest,  simple,  cleanly 
self-respectful  attire  and  air  which  becomes  the 
apprentice  no  less  than  the  servant,  each  accord- 
ing to  his  class.  And  these,  if  the  honesty  and 
industry  of  the  aspect  mate  them,  win  a  silent 
tribute  of  respect  from  all  beholders,  and  are  the 
sure  passport  to  the  higher  rooms.  Obedience, 
sobriety,  industry,  honesty,  neatness,  cleanness, 
courtesy — these  are  the  servant's  graces.  And 
again  I  say,  they  are  as  honourable,  as  precious, 
in  the  eye  of  Heaven,  as  needful  for  the  work  and 
glory  of  God's  kingdom,  as  the  most  splendid  tal- 
ent, the  most  masterly  genius,  which  have  ever 
played  the  chief  parts  on  the  theatre  of  the  history 
of  the  word.  There  is  no  respect  of  persons  with 
God.  The  slave  with  Him  is  as  great  or  as  little 
as  the  king. 


i 


The  Faithful  Servant.  117 

I  liave  spoken  of  self-respect.  Witli  one  word 
on  tills  I  close.  The  ground  of  nil  true  self-re- 
spect is  Christ.  If  we  think  within  ourselves 
what  fine  fellows  we  are,  and  what  honour  and 
homage  we  have  a  right  to  demand,  we  may  very 
possibly  be  left  to  admire  ourselves  alone.  But 
if  we  humbly  remind  ourselves  of  the  Lord's 
thought  for  us  and  hope  of  us,  how  much  He 
wrought  and  how  much  He  suffered,  because  He 
would  not  allow  that  we  were  fit  only  for  the  dev- 
il's work  and  wage,  we  shall  feel  stirring  within 
us  an  earnest  desire  to  become  something  like 
what  the  Saviour  hoped — the  hope  for  which  and 
in  which  He  died.  That  is  the  fundamental  prin- 
ciple of  self-respect.  We  are  to  respect  the  Lord's 
part  in  us,  and  hope  of  us.  Wq  are  never  to  feel 
that  it  is  not  worth  while  to  struggle,  and  never 
may  we  dare  to  think  that  we  are  too  humble  to 
make  it  of  much  account  what  we  think,  will, 
and  do.  The  publicans,  the  sinners,  the  beggars, 
these  were  the  chosen  companions  of  His  pilgrim- 
age, and  His  gentleness  made  them  great.  It  was 
the  pagan  feeling  that  the  gods  were  too  busy 
with  their  own  pursuits  and  pleasures,  to  care 
much  how  such  tiny  motes  as  men  might  play  in 
the  sunbeams,  which  lay  at  the  root  of  the  demor- 


118  The  Home  Life. 

alisation  of  the  heatlien  world,  and  its  frightful 
despair.  Christ  does  care,  He  cares  quite  infi- 
nitely,. He  cares  with  a  care  of  which  you  have 
no  measure  but  Calvary,  how  you  live,  how  you 
win,  and  how  you  spend  your  hardly-earned  gains. 
This  is  the  beginning  of  the  workman's  gospel ; 
and  it  comes  out  of  the  straits  and  the  struggles 
of  a  workman's  home.  Christ  has  joy  in  your 
honour  as  a  workman,  and  sorrows  over  your  folly 
and  shame.  Fellow-servant,  brother-workman, 
give  Him  joy  of  you ;  let  Him  "  see  of  the  travail 
of  His  soul-  and  be  satisfied  "  in  your  life.  The 
hour  is  at  hand  when  He  shall  lift  up  the  head  of 
the  faithful  servant  and  workman  With  honour,  in 
the  midst  of  the  most  illustrious  company  of  the 
universe,  in  the  day  of  the  manifestation  of  the 
sons  of  God. 


Y. 

EDUCATION". 

"  Bring  tTiem  up  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the 
LordP — Eph.  vi.  4. 

The  world  is  tlie  home  wliicli  God  has  pre- 
pared for  the  educatioi}  of  His  children.  The 
world  that  is,  is  fashioned  as  it  is  that  it  may  be 
the  theatre  of  their  education;  the  world  that 
shall  be,  the  new  heaven  and  the  new  earth,  which 
will  be  born  one  day  out  of  the  bondage  of  corrup- 
tion, will  be  the  theatre  of  their  developed  and 
perfected  life.  The  whole  system  of  nature  seems 
to  have  been  wondrously  wrought  to  be  the  in- 
strument of  our  training ;  the  system  of  the  new 
creation  will  be  modulated  to  the  key  of  our  per- 
fect and  glorious  life.  But  man  is  everywhere 
the  centre.  On  him  the  son,  the  heir,  the  works 
of  God  in  all  His  worlds  attend.  Round  man,  as 
he  stood  in  Eden,  perfect  in  the  natural  image  of 


120  The  Home  Life. 

God,  wherein  lie  was  formed,  tlie  whole  creation 
ranged  itself  as  its  natural  centre ;  and  in  man  as 
he  shall  "  stand  up "  in  heaven,  perfect  in  the 
spiritual  image  of  Christ,  whereinto  he  is  re- 
deemed, the  new  creation,  and  all  that  fills  it, 
shall  find  the  key  to  their  order  eternally. 

These  may  seem  to  be  overhigh  thoughts  of 
the  position  and  relation  of  a  being  so  fallen,  so 
shorn  of  his  splendour  as  man.  So  thought  not 
He  who  "  hi  the  leginning  was  with  God^  and 
wa^  Ood^''  "  who  lecame  flesh  and  dwelt  among 
us  /  "  and  who  "  seeing  that  the  children  are  par- 
takers of  flesh  and  hloo^,  Himself  likewise,  toolz 
part  of  the  same  ;  that  through  death  He  might 
destroy  him  that  had  the  power  of  death,  that  is 
the  devil  /  and  deliver  them  who  through  fear  of 
death  were  all  their  lifetime  subject  to  bondage. 
For  verily  He  took  not  on  Him  the  nature  of  an- 
gels /  but  He  took  on  Him  the  seed  of  Abraham. 
Wherefore  in  all  things  it  behoved  Him  to  be  made 
like  unto  His  brethren,  that  He  might  be  a  merci- 
ful amd  faithful  high  priest  in  things  pertaining 
to  God,  to  make  reconciliation  for  the  sins  of  the 
people.  For  in  that  He  himself  hath  suffered 
being  tempted,  He  is  able  to  succour  tJiem  that  are 
Umpted;'  (Heb.  ii.  14-18.) 


fc 


Education,  121 

And  to  him  who  wrote  these  words  it  was  no 
incredible  thing,  nay,  it  was  the  most  credible  of 
all  things,  that  the  whole  creation  waited,  and 
would  wait,  groaning  and  travailing  now,  enfran- 
chised and  glorified  then,  on  the  education  and 
manifestation  of  the  sons  of  God.  God  makes  all 
things  on  earth  and  in  heaven  subordinate  to  the 
culture  and  unfolding,  through  grace,  of  our  di- 
vine though  sin-perverted  powers.  Education, 
the  education  of  immortal  human  spirits,  is  with 
Him  the  great  work  of  the  great  universe ;  for  He 
who  made  the  worlds,  and  who  sustains  the  worlds, 
gave  Himself  that  He  might  accomphsh  it.  And 
this  is  t^e  work  which  He  asks  you  human  par- 
ents to  share  with  Him,  and  to  make  your  great 
aim  and  object,  within  the  little  world  where  you 
play  the  god — your  home.  I  believe  it  to  be 
simply  impossible  to  estimate  fully  the  measure 
of  the  Lord's  interest  in  this  work,  and  the  cost 
of  effort  and  pain  which  He  has  spent  and  will 
spend  on  it,  to  be  repaid  in  the  day  when  "  the 
general  assembly  and  church  of  the  first-horn^'' 
shall  be  gathered  in  His  home,  and  He  shall  see 
in  them  "  of  the  fruit  of  the  travail  of  His  soul^ 
and  shall  le  satisfied^^  I  speak  of  all  things  as 
made  subordinate  to  this.  In  the  very  hour  of 
6 


122  The  Home  Life, 

the  transgression  the  world  fell  with  man.  Man 
changed  his  relations  to  God,  and  the  world 
changed  its  relations  to  man.  Because  of  him, 
"for  his  sake,"  the  earth  became  a  wilderness. 
Fair  as  it  had  been  in  its  Eden  beauty,  the  cm-se 
fell  on  it ;  it  grew  hard,  and  stem,  and  cold ;  it 
took  at  once  a  form,  the  reason  of  which  was  in 
man  himself.  iN'or  was  heaven  indifferent.  I 
know  not  what  the  cherubim  were — indeed,  I 
cannot  find  that  anybody  knows.  But  one  thing 
seems  clear,,  they  are  the  recognised  symbols  of 
unseen  spiritual  powers.  They  represented  to  the 
human  eye  the  unseen  might  and  majesty  of  the 
world  of  spirit,  and  man's  transgression  drew 
them  down  to  blend  heaven  with  earth  in  the 
work  of  human  discipline  and  culture.  The  tree 
of  life  passed  under  their  guard  until  the  long  pil- 
grimage should  be  ended,  and  is  destined  to  bloom 
afresh  in  the  new  paradise,  which  these  spirits 
guard  and  tend  for  us  beyond  the  wilderness  and 
the  river  of  death. 

In  truth  earth  and  heaven  join  their  forces 
that  man's  educatipn  for  eternal  life  may  be  a 
triumph ;  God's  great  triumph  over  the  devil,  and 
overthrow  of  his  work.  "Well  may  George  Her- 
bert in  prophetic  mood  declare — 


Education,  123 

"  My  God,  I  heard  this  day, 
That  none  doth  build  a  stately  habitation 
But  he  that  means  to  dwell  therein. 
What  house  more  stately  hath  there  been, 
Or  can  be,  than  is  man?  «o  whose  creation 
All  things  are  in  decay. 

"  For  man  is  every  thing. 
And  more :  he  is  a  tree,  yet  bears  no  fruit, 
A  beast,  yet  is,  or  should  be,  more : 
Eeason  and  speech  we  onely  bring. 
Parrots  may  thank  us,  if  they  are  not  mute, 
They  go  upon  the  score. 

"  Man  is  all  symmetric. 
Full  of  proportions,  one  limbe  to  another. 
And  all  to  all  the  world  besides : 
Each  part  may  call  the  farthest,  brother : 
For  head  with  foot  hath  private  amitie, 
And  both  with  moons  and  tides. 

"Nothing  hath  got  so  farre. 
But  man  hath  caught  and  kept  it  as  his  prey. 

His  eyes  dismount  the  highest  starre :  ^ 

He  is  in  little  all  the  sphere. 
Herbs  gladly  cure  our  flesh,  because  that  they 
Find  their  acquaintance  there.. 

.     "For  us  the  winds  do  blow ; 
The  earth  doth  rest,  heaven  i^ove,  and  fountains  flow. 


124  The  Home  Life. 

Nothing  we  see,  but  means  onr  good, 
As  our  delight,  or  as  our  treasure  ; 
The  whole  is,  either  our  cupboard  of  food, 
Or  cabinet  of  pleasure. 

"  The  starres  have  us  to  bed ; 
Night  draws  the  curtain,  which  the  sun  withdraws ; 
Musick  and  light  attend  our  head, 
All  things  unto  our  flesh  are  kinde 
In  their  descent  and  being :  to  our  minde 
In  their  ascent  and  cause. 

"More  servants  wait  on  man 
Than  he  '11  take  notice  of:  in  every  path 

He  treads  down  that  which  doth  befriend  him 
When  sicknesse  makes  him  pale  and  wan. 
Oh,  mightie  love !     Man  is  one  world,  and  hath 
Another  to  attend  him. 

"  Since  then,  my  God,  Thou  hast 
So  brave  a  palace  built ;  oh,  dwell  in  it, 
That  it  may  dwell  with  thee  at  last ! 
Till  then,  afford  us  so  much  wit. 
That,  as  the  world  serves  us,  we  may  serve  Thee,  " 
And  both  Thy  servants  be." 

To  this  end  God  has  made  all  creation  doc- 
trinal, full  of  the  truth  on  which  He  seeks  to 
mould  the  whole  of  man's  inner  nndying  life. 
We  get  terribly  perplexed  in  these  days  of  tri- 
umphant science,  with  the  distance  to  \yhich,  so 


Education.  125 

to  speak,  tlie  living  personal  Presence  in  nature 
is  removed.  To  tlie  child's  eye  the  daily  familiar 
aspects  of  nature  easily  connect  themselves  with 
a  living  hand.  The  language  of  the  Psalms 
about  the  phenomena  of  the  universe,  describes 
perfectly  the  child's  impressions,  and  the  impres- 
sions of  childish  hearts  everywhere.  We  have 
outgrown  the  childish  wisdom;  God  grant  that 
we  may  not  outgrow  likewise  childlikeness  of 
spirit  and  of  heart.  But  simple  souls,  unversed 
in  the  mysteries  of  knowledge,  unpuzzled  by  the 
problems  which  the  intellect  states  but  fails  to 
solve,  and  careless  of  the  prizes  which  intellect 
must  agonise  to  win,  find  the  old  beliefs  still  cred- 
ible. To  them  it  is  the  Lord's  eve  which  blazes 
in  the  lightning,  the  Lord's  terrible  Voice  which 
in  the  thunder  rolls  its  warnings  over  the  world. 
They  hear  the  sound  of  the  Lord's  footstep  as  of 
old,  a^  the  breeze  whispers  at  even  among  the 
trees  of  the  garden ;  and  as  the  morning  flushes 
the  dewy  air,  a  benediction  seems  to  fall  from  on 
high  over  the  waking  world.  To  them  the  lilies 
still  wear  the  glorious  dress  in  which  He  clothed 
them ;  and  nightly  they  watch  the  unseen  Shep- 
herd lead  forth  on  the  wolds  of  heaven  His  flock 
of  stars.     The  earth  seems  thronged,  as  when  the 


126  The  Home  Life. 

veil  was  lifted  for  Jacob,  -with  celestial  visitants  ; 
still  they  hear  the  "  sound  of  the  going "  of  an- 
gelic pinions  in  the  mulberry  tops;  and  in  the 
silent  mountain  solitudes  there  is  the  murmur 
of  a  life  of  which  this  earth  is  not  the  only 
parent — and  there  the  veil  seems  but  a  thin  one, 
which  hides  the  unseen  workman  from  mortal 
sight. 

But  science  rends  the  veil  in  sunder,  and  the 
living  presence  seems  to  vanish.  The  child's 
belief  faints  before  the  vision  of  the  awful  force 
and  magnitude  of  the  powers,  which  maintain 
the  play  of  life  in  the  creation,  the  ebb  and  the 
flow  of  its  tidal  seas.  There  is  such  calm  cer- 
tainty and  constancy,  there  is  such  orderly  inevi- 
table sequence  in  those  phenomena  of  creation, 
which  seemed  to  us  so  fraught  with  living  intel- 
ligence, that-  the  thought  of  a  living  will  fades 
into  the  conception  of  a  fixed,  formal,  unalterable 
law.  Things  seemingly  the  most  eccentric,  when 
traced  back  to  their  springs,  fall  calmly  into  this 
order,  which  has  suffered  no  breach  since  the  be- 
ginning of  creation ;  an  order  so  close,  so  abso- 
lute, that  could  a  hair  or  a  grain  of  dust  move 
out  on  an  independent  mission  for  one  moment, 
the  keystone  of  the  arch  would  be  shattered,  and 


Education.  127 

"Cosmos"  would  settle  into  Chaos  once  more. 
We  feel  om'selves  pigmies  in  tlie  presence  of  such 
masses  and  forces  as  science  unveils  to  us.  It  is 
hard  for  us  even  to  hold  fast  the  consciousness  of 
an  independent  will,  an  independent  originating 
power,  when  all  things  around  us,  to  the  remotest 
bounds  of  the  universe,  through  spaces  which 
thought  can  but  faintly  measure,  fulfil  with  such 
calm,  impassive  submission  the  behests  of  prime- 
val unalterable  law. 

"  Is  not  man  a  part  of  the  machine,  more 
deftly  fashioned,  with  more  subtle  and  complica- 
ted keys  ? "  is  the  question  which  science  is  ever 
pressing  upon  us ;  a  question  which  some  of  the 
keenest  intellects  busy  in  this  field  are  not  afraid 
to  answer,  in  terms  which  seem  to  us  to  deny  at 
once  the  living  Man  of  whom  the  Scripture  speaks 
to  us,  and  the  living  God.  I  feel,  and  doubtless 
you  feel,  the  pei-plexity  of  the  problems  which 
science  is  daily  pressing  upon  us,  and  how  hard  it 
is  to  hold  fast  our  faith  in  the  reality  of  any  mir- 
acle, of  a  revealed  word,  of  the  power  of  prayer. 
And  I  often  turn  from  the  perplexed  problem  to 
refresh  my  mind,  and  to  renew  my  faith  and 
hope,  by  the  contemplation  of  the  palpable  moral 
meanings  and  bearings  of  the  great  facts  of  the 


128  The  Home  Life. 

creation ;  the  visible  correspondence  between  the 
system  of  the  world,  and  the  workings,  the  un- 
foldings,  of  that  inner  life  with  which  the  Scrip- 
ture concerns  itself,  and  which  grows  ont  of  the 
communion  of  a  living  human  will  with  the  liv- 
ing personal  God. 

And  I  do  not  mean  simply,  when  I  speak  of 
the  living  presence  of  a  moral  Being  which  re- 
veals itself  in  creation,  that  there  is  a  certain  par- 
allelism between  the  fixity  of  the  moral  and  the 
natural  laws,  which  makes  the  method  of  God's 
way  with  us  as  creatures,  the  key  to  the  higher 
method  of  His  way  with  us  as  sons.  This  is  a 
very  wonderful  aspect  of  the  world.  The  ab- 
soluteness w^ith  which  God  wdll  have  us  obey 
the  ordinances  which  His  wisdom  has  fixed  for 
us  as  creatures,  is  the  sign  of  the  absoluteness 
which  reigns  also  in  the  higher  region.  As  well 
may  we  eat  poison,  and  expect  to  be  nourished 
by  it  in  body,  as  drink,  wanton,  wrangle,  and 
hate,  and  expect  to  grow  strong  and  comely  in 
soul.  But  I  mean  further,  that  there  are  images 
of  man's  spiritual  relations  and  duties  everywhere 
around  him  in  the  creation;  as  though  God  in 
shaping  all  things  had  looked  on  to  the  unfoldings 
of  the  higher  life — the  divine  life  of  redeemed 


Education.  129 

men,  wliich  springs  out  of  His  personal  action  on 
human  hearts. 

There  is  not  one  of  the  great  forms  of  human 
duty,  there  is  not  one  of  the  great  relations  of 
Christian  society,  which  does  not  find  some  image 
and  prophecy  of  itself  in  the  creation.  The  com- 
munion, the  mutual  ministry,  of  souls  in  Christ, 
the  Church  the  body  of  the  Lord,  may  each  find 
a  fair  image  of  itself  in  the  material  organisation 
of  this  fleshy  body,  the  principle  of  which  runs 
through  the  universe.  Things  could  only  have 
been  made  as  they  are  with  a  view  to  the  redemp- 
tive work,  the  accomplishment  of  which  calls 
forth  the  highest  energy  of  the  Father  of  spirits, 
and  makes,  so  to  speak,  the  living  God  an  ever- 
present  actor  on  the  theatre  of  human  history. 
If  we  see  God  busy  with  this  higher  work,  the 
work  of  calling,  justifying,  sanctifying,  and  glori- 
fying our  individual  spirits,  it  becomes  easier  to 
discern  Him  behind  all  that  vast  apparatus  of 
force  which  we  name  laws  of  natm'e ;  through  the 
whole  of  which  we  trace  the  ideas  and  purposes, 
which  express  themselves  fully  in  the  spiritual 
sphere  of  our  being,  wherein  we  see  the  Father 
in  Christ,  and  speak  with  the  living  God,  face  to 
face,  as  a  man  speaketh  with  his  friend.  While  I 
6* 


130  The  Home  Life. 

see  so  much  in  nature  wliich  I  can  only  under- 
stand when  I  turn  to  the  Church,  and  the  rela- 
tions of  redeemed  souls,  for  its  interpretation,  this 
mass  and  force,  this  calm  constancy  of  law,  lose 
their  power  either  to  oppress  or  to  bewilder  me. 
The  God  whom  I  know  in  Christ,  seems  to  pass 
with  me  into  the  temple  of  creation.  I  have  not 
to  stand  in  the  outer  court  and  peer  through  the 
veil,  to  discover  what  the  visible  things  can  reveal 
to  me  of  the  "  invisible  things  of  God." 

The  education,  then,  of  human  spirits,  the  un- 
folding within  them  of  the  divine  image,  and 
their  purification  from  the  blots  and  stains  of  sin, 
is  the  supreme  work  of  the  universe,  the  supreme 
puj'pose  and  hope  of  its  King.  And  God  has 
myriad  voices  and  influences  under  the  control  of 
His  hand  to  subserve  that  purpose,  and  to  fulfil 
that  hope.  The  creation  is  full  of  His  teachings. 
He  embosoms  the  infant  in  a  world  of  wonder 
and  beauty,  which  begins  at  once,  from  the  mo- 
ment that  his  eyes  open  on  the  light,  to  educate, 
that  is  to  draw  forth  and  enlarge  his  4)owers. 
Everything  that  meets  the  eye,  the  ear,  or  the 
touch,  is  educating  them,  is  leading  them  forth  to 
a  larger  apprehension,  which  God  meets  ever  with 
fresh  supplies.     The  early  education  of  the  human 


Education.  131 

infant  is  simply  the  drawing  out  its  power  to  ap- 
prehend, take  in,  and  possess  its  world.  Its  first 
discovery  is  that  hands  and  feet  belong  to  it. 
Few  things  are  more  wonderful  to  look  npon  than 
a  baby  beginning  in  some  dim  way  to  consider 
the  question,  whether  the  foot  which  it  grasps 
with  its  tiny  hand  belongs  to  it,  and  what  this 
belonging  may  mean.  When  at  length  it  has  dis- 
covered its  body,  and  fairly  occupied  it,  it  begins 
straightway  to  discover  its  world.  The  whole 
system  of  things  around  it  is  a  temptation  to  dis- 
covery. There  is  an  ever-widejiing  horizon; 
every  object  that  it  sees,  every  tone  that  it  hears, 
but  introduces  the  eye  and  the  ear  to  some  braver 
object  or  richer  tone,  which  lie  dimly  as  yet  on 
th^  bounds  of  its  horiz(^,  but  which  it  must  reach 
and  include  within  its  field.  Creation  is  hke  a 
great  magnet,  continually  drawing  out  the  pow- 
ers. And  as  they  go  forth  they  grow  strong,  they 
range  boldly  round  a  wider  and  yet  wider  circuit, 
and  everything  which  they  discover  is  a  stimulus 
to  new  quest,  with  no  limit  in  sight  but  God. 

Perhaps,  though,  I  have  spoken  hastily  in  say- 
ing that  the  child's  first  discovery  is  that  hands 
and  feet  belong  to  it.  The  first  thing  w^ch  an 
infant  discovers  in  the  universe  is  love.     God's 


132  The  Home  Life. 

order  of  the  world  is  in  every  possible  form  a  pro- 
test against  isolation,  a  witness  against  the  self  as 
the  starting-point  of  life.  The  fii*st  impression  on 
the  young  child's  heart,  as  the  mother's  prond  and 
tender  glances  rest  on  it,  is  the  sense  of  belong- 
ing. There  is  one  to  whom  it  belongs,  there  is 
one  who  belongs  to  it,  on  Ivhose  care  it  reposes,  in 
whose  love  it  nestles,  before  it  has  taken  in  an 
impression  about  either  body  or  world.  The  in- 
ner world,  after  all,  is  the  first  world  that  it  meets 
with ;  and  the  mother's  love,  from  the  first  mo- 
ment, begins  ij;s  training  for  the  love  of  man  and 
the  love  of  God.  God  is  nearer  to  it  in  that 
mother's  glance  and  touch,  than  in  anything 
which  concerns  its  hfe  as  a  creature  of  this  world. 
And,  oh,  how  tender  shoijd  be  the  glance,  how 
soft  should  be  the  touch,  which  have  to  speak  for 
Him !  The  mother's  love  is  just  the,  tuning  of 
the  inward  ear,  to  catch  at  length  and  interpret 
the  tones  of  the  gi*eat  Father's  voice.  Mothers ! 
touch  tenderly  this  delicate  tympanum,  which, 
rudely  struck  or  harshly  jarred,  may  be  deaf 
through  life  to  all  the  higher  voices  of  man  and 
of  God. 

Th^e  thoughts  reveal  to  us  the  essential  prin- 
ciple of  all  education,  the  drawing  forth  the  pow- 


Education.  133 

ers  to  discern  so  mucli  of  fact  and  trutli  as  tliey 
are  fitted  to  take  in.  It  is  tlie  process  which  the 
Divine  Teacher  employs  through  life  on  our  edu- 
cation. That  which  a  man  finds,  which  he  dis- 
covers by  the  use  of  his  powers,  guided  but  not 
superseded  by  the  teacher's,  that  he  possesses,  and 
that  alone.  He  is  not  a  receptacle  to  be  filled 
with  knowledge ;  he  is  a  living  organ  to  be  drawn 
forth  to  discover  it.  Truth  meets  the  seeker,  just 
when  his  search,  his  desire,  is  strong  enough  to 
take  possession  of  the  prize.  The  pouring  in  sys- 
tem, as  if  yoimg  souls  were  jars  i^  which  the 
honey  of  knowledge  could  be  easily  stored  for 
profitable  use,  files  in  the  face  of  the  method  of 
Providence.  The  drawing  forth  the  faculty  is  the 
first  half  of  knowledge,  and  the  end  of  knowledge 
when  won,  is  the  leading  forth  the  faculties  to  a 
fresh  discovery  of  a  larger  store. 

And  why,  with  such  a  grand  apparatus  of  ed- 
ucation at  his  command,  does  not  God  keep  the 
work  in  His  own  hand,  and  under  His  own  exclu- 
sive charge  ?  It  is  the  thing  which  He  chiefiy 
cares  for,  and  for  which  He  maintains  the  world. 
All  things  that  are,  from  hyssop  on  the  wall  to 
the  stars  that  cluster  on  the  dim  bounds  of  the 
universe,  are  His  instruments  for  the  education 


134  The  Home  Life. 

of  His  child.  But  the  supreme  power  seems  to 
be  lodged  witli  man.  As  far  as  outward  beings 
an.d  things  are  concerned,  there  is  nothing  in  the 
world  whose  influence  in  the  education  of  man 
can  compare  with  the  human.  Man,  after  all,  is 
the  educator  to  whom  God  has  committed  His 
child.  The  work  of  tlTe  creation  is  vague  and 
partial,  the  influence  of  man  is  intimate  and  su- 
preme. Man  can  either  choke  or  clear  the  chan- 
nels by  which  the  objects  of  creation  reach  and 
draw  forth  the  powers.  ISTay — and  it  is  an  awful 
thought — ^how  much  may  man  do  to  choke  or 
keep  open  the  channels  for  the  approach  of  God ! 
Man  .may  blind  the  eye  and  seal  the  ear  of  child- 
hood to  all  that  is  holy  and  beautiful  in  the  uni- 
verse; man  may  so  vitiate  the  sense,  that  the 
world  to  its  young  denizen  shall  seem  like  a  grim 
prison,-  or  a  loathsome  charnel-house,  full  of  clank- 
ing chains,  or  "  of  dead  men's  bones  and  all  un- 
cleanness."  And  yet  the  Almighty  Father  sends 
His  young  nurselings  hither  by  millions,  genera- 
tion after  generation.  He  puts  them  under  the 
absolute  rule  of  those  who  can  teach  them  to  hate 
Him,  to  blaspheme  His  name  wath  their  infant 
lips,  and  mimic  with  their  infant  powers  the  vices 


Education.  135 

and  tlie  crimes  with,  which,  their  manhood  will 
defile  and  devastate  His  world. 

It  is  a  dread  mystery — this  trust  of  the  most 
precious  thing  which  God  holds  to  man,  to  be 
feebly  nursed  to  a  godly  maturity  by  the  best  of 
men,  to  be  mightily  wa^'ped  and  debased  to  un- 
godly foulness  and  deformity  by  the  worst.  And 
how  stand  the  worst  to  the  best,  in  proportion,  in 
all  ages  of  the  world?  And  the  trust  goes  on 
widening  ever,  and  with  it,  we  are  tempted  to  say, 
widens  still  the  folly,  the  sin,  the  misery  of  man- 
kind. It  is  but  a  little  way  that  we  can  hope  to 
see  into  the  heart  of  this  mystery — why  God 
trusts  so  freely  beings  such  as  we  are,  with  the 
education  of  spirits  who  are  to  people  heaven  or 
hell ;  and  which  they  are  to  people,  seems  to  de- 
pend in  fearful  measure  upon  us. 

He  has  parents  to  educate  as  well  as  children ; 
that  helps  us  some  way  to  the  understanding  of 
the  mystery.  "With  many  a  hard  sinner  the  only 
hold  that  God  has  upon  him  is  his  child.  The 
institution  of  the  home  was  God's  great  lesson  to 
man  on  the  meaning  and  fruit  of  transgression. 
When  the  first  transgressors  had  a  home  to  rule, 
and  children  to  wound  and  wrong  them,  they  un-_ 
derstood,  as  no  teaching  could  have  made  them 


136  The  Home  Life. 

understand,  what  had  happened  through  them  in 
the  home  of  the  Lord.  The  lineaments  of  their 
own  evil  reproduced  themselves  in  their  offspring ; 
and  in  the  discipline  which  they  learnt  to  exer- 
cise, in  sheer  necessity,  they  discovered  the  key 
to  the  discipline  of  God.  God  would  make  man 
His  fellow-helper  in  the*work  of  education;  He 
first  made  man  His  fellow-sufferer  as  a  father  in 
the  experience  of  the  sins  and  sorrows  of  his  child. 

This  reflex  action  of  education  on  the  parent 
is  not  the  least  momentous  feature  of  it.  God 
seeks  to  educate  us  by  trusting  us — ^by  calling  us 
to  high  duties,  by  laying  on  us  grave  responsibili- 
ties. And  He  chooses  deliberately  the  high  re- 
sults w^hich  may  flow  from  this  lofty  method,  with 
the  possibility,  nay,  the  certainty,  of  the  dark 
mischiefs  which  sin  will  take  occasion  to  work  by 
it,  rather  than  content  Himself  with  the  more 
sure,  though  more  moderate  and  common  results 
which  might  issue  from  a  method  in  a  lower  key. 

But  there  is  another  aspect  of  the  matter  at 
which  for  the  moment  we  must  glance.  It  is  very 
wonderful  on  the  part  of  God  that  He  should  put 
such  trust  in  man.  Is  there  nothing  wonderful  in 
the  fact  that  man  should  accept  such  trust  from 
God  ?    I  mean  the  man  who  understands  all  that 


Education.  137 

it  involves,  and  sees  plainly  its  possible  issues. 
There  is  something  very  terrible  in  the  mission  of 
a  prophet  or  an  apostle,  who  knows  that  his  word 
mnst  be  ''^  a  savour  of  life  unto  life^  or  of  death 
unto  deatli^"^  making  salvation  doubly  blessed,  or 
perdition  doubly  damned.  It  is  a  mission  which 
in  a  measure  the  parent  shares.  "  Who  is  suffi- 
cient for  these  things j^"^  the  training  of  these  young 
immortals  ?  Who  dares  to  put  a  hasty  hand  to 
such  a  sacred  ark  of  God  as  this  ?  ^ay,  who 
could  rest  in  the  prospect  of  training  children  af- 
ter his  »own  image,  to  be  only  as  wise,  as  true,  as 
noble,  as  pm-e,  as  good  as  himself?  Is  it  that  we 
may  reproduce  our  mental  and  moral  image  in 
our  children  that  God  entrusts  them  to  us,  that 
we  may  help  to  fill  His  universe  with  such  frac- 
tured and  distorted  images  of  our  Maker,  as,  alas ! 
we  wear  ?  This  opens  to  us  the  real  question,  and 
sets  us  on  the  threshold  of  the  trjie  work  of  edu- 
cation, the  first  work,  the  fundamental  work. 
This,  well  done,  makes  all  other  elements  of  a 
complete  education  wholly  subordinate ;  and  this 
undone,  makes  the  most  splendid  genius  but  a 
baleful  prodigy,  and  the  widest  knowledge  but  a 
dreary  and  pestilential  waste. 

I  have  said  that  of  all  that  is  without  a  child 


138  The  Home  Life. 

there  is  no  influence  comparable  witli  the  human. 
The  parent's  power,  looking  on  it  from  without, 
seems  to  be  well-nigh  absolute,  either  to  nurture 
and  develop,  or  to  corrupt  and  destroy.  The  issue 
seems  to  be  in  our  hands,  and  who  dares  bear  the 
burden  ?  Who  dares  undertake  the  main  charge 
of  the  nurture  of  children  with  such  a  nature 
within  them,  with  a  world  of  such  fearful  tempta- 
tion around  them,  and  with  heaven  and  hell  as 
their  bourne  in  sight  ?  Well  may  a  godly  parent 
tremble  at  the  prospect;  as  Moses  trembled,  as 
Isaiah  trembled,  as  Paul  trembled,  before  the 
threshold  of  a  mission,  which  bore  in  its  bosom 
such  issues  for  man  through  time  and  through 
eternity. 

There  is  something  very  solemn  in  the  concep- 
tion of  the  nature  and  pressure  of  this  burden, 
to  which  Moses  gives  expression  in  the  following 
passage.  It  shows  us  how  much  he  was  willing  to 
bear,  if  he  might  but  find  strength  to  be  a  fellow- 
worker  with  God.  "  Then  Moses  heard  the  peo- 
jole  weep  throughout  their  families,  every  man  in 
the  door  of  his  tent ;  and  the  anger  of  the  Lord 
was  Mndled  greatly :  Moses  also  was  displeased. 
And  Moses  said  unto  the  Lord,  Wherefore  hast 
Thou  afflicted  Thy  servant  f  am,d  wherefore  have 


Education.  139 

I  not  found  favour  in  Thy  sight,  that  Thou  layest 
the  'burden  of  all  this  jpeoj^le  ujpon  me  f  Have  I 
conceived  all  this  people?  have  Ihegotten  them, 
that  Thou  shouldst  say  unto  me,  Carry  them  in 
thy  hosom,  as  a  nursing  father  heareth  the  sitching 
child,  unto  the  land  which  Thou  swarest  unto 
their  fathers  f  Whence  should  I  have  flesh  to 
give  unto  all  this  people  f  for  they  weep  unto  me, 
saying.  Give  us  flssh,  that  we  may  eat.  I  am  not 
able  to  hear  all  this  people  alone,  because  it  is  too 
heavy  for  me.  And  if  Thou  deal  thus  with  me, 
Mil  me,  I  pray  Thee,  out  of  hand,  if  I  have 
found  favour  in  Thy  sight 'j  and  let  me  not  see 
'my  wretchedness  "  (Numb.  xi.  10-15). 

But  here  the  question  arises,  the  vital  ques- 
tion, is  the  main  charge .  after  all  with  man  ?  Is 
the  nearest,  the  most  intimate,  the  most  powerful 
of  the  influences  which  from  the  first  are  at  work 
upon  the  child,  the  influence  of  the  parent  %  Out- 
wardly it  is  palpably  so.  But  is  there  no  inward 
influence  which  can  claim  the  supremacy,  no  un- 
seen guide  and  teacher  who  can  take  the  crushing 
weight  of  the  burden  out  of  our  hands  ?  This  is 
the  question  of  questions  in  the  matter  of  Chris- 
tian education,  and  on  the  answer  to  it  the  very 
possibility  of  any  education  in  a  high  sense  de- 


140  The  Home  Life, 

pends.  Is  there  a  light  that,  "  coming  into  the 
world,  lighteth  every  man,"  every  child?  Is 
there  a  light  in  that  young  infant,  shining  in 
the  first  dawnings  of  consciousness,  and  striving 
against  the  darkness  ?  If  you  answer  me, "  There 
was  once  such  a  light  in  man,  but  the  light  was 
lost  in  the  hour  of  the  transgression,  and  we  can 
only  bring  the  young  child  to  Clirist,  if  perchance 
He  may  rekindle  it,"  then,  alas !  for  you,  and  if 
it  all  depends  on  your  bringing,  alas!  for  the 
young  child.  This  surely  is  a  fundamental  prin- 
ciple in  all  Christian  education — the  child  is 
Christ's  child.  You  have  not  to  bring  it  into^  but 
to  bring  it  ujp  in  "the  nurture  and  admonition  of ■ 
the  Lord."  You  have  to  unfold  to  it  the  mean- 
ing and  virtue  of  a  relation  that  is,  not  to  pre- 
pare it  to  enter  into  a  relation  which  may  be,  or 
may  not. 

There  is  no  need  that  I  should  repeat  what  I 
have  said  already  of  little  children,  whom  Christ 
gathered  in  His  arms,  and  blessed,  and  of  whom 
He  said,  "  Suffer  tlie  little  children  to  come  unto 
3fe,  andfmMd  them  not ;  for  of  such  is  the  Mng- 
dom  of  fieavenP  It  surely  is  significant  that  as 
the  circle  of  the  Church  widened,  and  its  mem- 
bers began  to  enter  into  the  closest  relations  with 


Education,  141 

the  world  around  them,  or  were  perplexed  as  to 
the  effect  of  relations  which  they  already  sus- 
tained, the  apostle  Panl  claims  the  children  of  one 
believing  parent  as  holy.  "  If  any  hr other  hath 
a  wife  that  helieveth  not^  and  she  he  pleased  to 
dwell  with  him^  let  him  not  put  her  away.  Aiid 
the  woman  which  hath  an  husband  that  helieveth 
not,  and  if  he  he  pleased  to  dwell  with  her,  let  her 
not  leave  him.  For  the  unbelieving  husband  is 
sanctified  by  the  wfe,  and  the  unbelieving  wife  is 
sanctified'  by  the  husband :  else  were  your  children 
unclean  I  but  now  are  they  holy^"^  (1  Cor.  vii.  12- 
14).  And  is  there  not  a  higher  and  more  solemn 
sense  in  which  Christ  claims  every  human  child 
as  holy,  not  through  the  accident  of  a  believing 
parent,  but  in  virtue  of  that  essential  brotherhood 
which  He  has  established  with  every  infant  of  the 
human  race  ? 

To  me,  the  word  education  would  be  mean- 
ingless, and  the  thing  impossible,  if  there  were  not 
One  who  can  come  infinitely  nearer  to  the  child's 
heart  than  we  can  come,  and  bring  influences  in- 
finitely more  powerful  than  any  that  we  can  com- 
mand, to  bear  upon  his  life.  The  first  step,  the 
vital  step,  in  the  work  of  education,  is  to  bear 
witness  to  the  child  of  Him.    E'ot  to  talk  to  the 


I 


142  The  Home  Life, 

child  about  Him  as  a  Being  outside  and  afar  off, 
wliom  the  child  has  to  seek ;  before  whom  with 
due  reverence  he  has  to  bend,  and  whose  favour- 
able audience  he  has  to  entreat.  There  is  the 
grand  mistake.  "We  talk  to  children  about  Christ 
at  a  distance,  far  off  in  presence,  far  off  in  nature, 
far  off  in  every  way.  We  tr j  to  dilute  our  knowl- 
edge of  Him  to  suit  their  little  understandings, 
and  to  make  familiar  what  in  its  own  nature  is 
remote  and  dread.  But  He  is  the  light  shining 
within  them ;  He  is  present  in  all  the  little  con- 
flicts which  are  fought  out  in  their  childish  hearts. 
Before  they  felt  the  touch  of  our  magnet,  the  at- 
traction of  His  was  upon  them.  Before  our 
voices  wakened  a  familiar  echo.  His  was  plead- 
ing, wooing,  winning,  in  the  inner  sanctuary  of 
their  young  lives.  There  is  a  light  of  which  every 
little  child  may  be  made  conscious,  shining  in  the 
darkness  within  it,  and  striving  to  conquer  it; 
showing  what  is  right  in  its  little  perplexities; 
teaching  it  that  truth  is  better  than  lies,  that  love 
is  better  than  hate,  that  peace  is  better  than  strife, 
and  that  right  is  better  than  wrong.  This  light 
gives  to  it  the  sensation  of  an  inward  glow  like 
coming  out  into  the  sunlight,  when  it  has  done 
the  right  thing,  or  said  the  true  word,  at  the  cost 


Education.  143 

of  some  effort,  or  by  some  little  sacrifice  ruled  a 
temper  or  conquered  a  fault.  Teach  the  child 
that  that  light  is  Christ,  the  Lord  of  the  great 
imiverse,  yet  present  with  all  His  glorious  power 
to  guide  the  first  thoughts,  to  train  the  first  de- 
sires, and  to  take  part  in  the  first  battles,  in  a 
young  child's  heart. 

You  have  taken  the  first  step,  the  divine  step, 
in  the  education  of  your  little  one,  when  you 
have  taught  him  to  connect  with  Christ,  and  to 
recognise  as  the  signs  of  His  presence,  every  mo- 
tion to  good  and  every  protest  against  evil,  which 
rises  up  with  a  strength  we  little  imagine  in  young 
children's  souls.  Let  the  child  understand  that 
the  Lord  of  the  universe  is  not  afar  off,  watching 
its  struggles,  but  within,  stirring  and  sustaining 
them ;  and  there  will  be  a  boldness  in  following 
the  good  and  resisting  the  evil,  which  in  these 
days,  when  we  mainly  believe  in  a  far  off  Christ, 
we  too  constantly  miss.  "  Say  not  m  thine  heart, 
Who  shall  ascend  into  heaven  f  (that  is,  to  "bring 
Christ  down  from  above :)  or,  Who  shall  descend 
into  the  deej>  f  {that  is,  to  bring  ujg  Christ  again 
from  the  dead.)  ....  llie  word  is  nigh  thee, 
even  in  thy  mouth,  and  in  thy  heart,^^  and  in  the 
mouth  and  in  the  heart  of  thy  little  one — the 


144  The  Home  Life. 

Word  ^^ Emmamiel^''  "God  with  us;"  the  en- 
grafted "Word,  God  within.  We  have  not  then  to 
take  the  child  to  Christ,  or  to  bring  Christ  to  the 
child ;  we  have  to  bear  witness  of  a  present  Christ, 
with  the  child,  within  the  child,  in  all  the  most 
familiar  phenomena  of  its  moral  life. 

And  here  is  the  sheet-anchor  of  a  parent's 
hope.  It  is  not  that,  if  he  strives,  Christ  will 
help  him,  but  that  Christ  is  already  before  him, 
and  is  the  chief  teacher ;  calling  him  to  help  in 
a  work,  which  already  engages  the  care  and  occu- 
pies the  thought  and  the  hand  of  God.  Draw 
forth  gently  the  latent  consciousness  of  that  as 
the  first  step  in  the  higher  education.  Unfold  to 
the  child  what  these  inward  discords,  these  in- 
ward witnessings,  strivings,  yearnings,  and  aspira- 
tions mean.  A  good  Lord  and  a  destroyer  strug- 
gling for  the  possession  of  his  spirit;  the  one 
pleading  and  striving  with  infinite  tenderness, 
the  other  ensnaring  and  enslaving  with  constant 
and  malignant  art.  Kindle  the  thought  of  the 
high  nature  of  this  conflict,  of  which  the  daily 
tasks  and  rounds  of  life  are  to  be  the  theatre  ;  re- 
veal, or  rather  teach  the  child  to  recognise,  the 
presence  of  a  form  like  unto  the  Son  of  man  in 
the  field  of  his  conflict,  the  furnace  of  his  trial. 


Education,  145 

Arm  liim,  and  send  him  forth  into  the  battle,  with 
the  inspiring  thought  that  he  can  never  be  alone 
in  any  extremity  of  peril,  pain,  or  pressm-e ;  for, 
nearer  to  him  than  a  mother,  nearer  than  a  broth- 
er, nearer  than  the  most  subtle  tempter,  nearer 
than  the  most  hellish  foe,  is  the  Lord,  who  was 
within  him  from  the  beginning,  and  whose  interest 
cannot  be  measured  even  by  his  own,  in  a  free 
and  noble  unfolding  of  his  life. 

But  there  is  a  great  danger  here,  against 
which  it  becomes  Christian  parents  to  be  con- 
stantly on  guard.  It  arises  from  the  very  earnest- 
ness of  their  desire  to  make  their  children  the  full 
sharers  of  the  joy  and  the  hope  with  which  the 
gospel  has  lit  their  lives.  It  is  a  grievous  mistake 
to  let  "  the  powers  of  the  world  to  come  "  over- 
shadow the  young  spirit  too  soon.  As  Moses  put 
a  veil  over  his  face  in  speaking  to  his  children,  so 
God  puts  a  veil  over  His  face  in  speaking  to  every 
human  child.  That  veil  is  the  parent,  who  stands 
to  the  young  child  in  "  the  stead  of  God ; "  happy 
for  the  parent,  happy  for  the  child,  if  he  can  fill 
for  the  time  the  place  of  God.  The  light  should 
grow  on  the  child's  consciousness  like  the  dawn, 
and  the  twilight  is  the  parent's  rule.  There  are 
parents  who  cannot  be  satisfied  unless  they  flash 


k 


146  The  Home  Life. 

the  liglit  at  once  in  all  its  brightness  on  the  young 
child's  heart,  and  teach  the  little  ones  to  mimic 
the  functions  and  to  touch  the  burdens  which  will 
one  day  try  to  the  utmost  their  manly  and  wo- 
manly strength.  The  result  of  the  process  is, 
those  ministering  angels  with  the  wings  off,  whom 
American  writers  first  palmed  upon  us  as  human 
children ;  the  vision  of  whom,  could  we  see  many 
of  them  about  the  pathways  of  life,  would  make 
the  sad  world  sadder  than  it  is.  Happily,  out  of 
fiction,  they  are  rare. 

Those  who  rob  us  of  the  fun,  the  joyousness, 
the  dash  of  childhood,  can  give  us  but  poor  equiv- 
alents in  exchange.  "  Ministering  children," 
early  taught  the  gravity  of  a  vocation,  little  know 
how  they  are  killing  manhood  and  womanhood, 
by  robbing  childhood  of  its  buoyant  and  gleeful 
life ;  while  children  who  catch  early  from  a  par- 
ent's contagious  goodness  and  gentleness  the  love 
of  ministry,  are  preparing  to  contribute  some- 
thing better  than  a  wingless  angel  to  the  consola- 
tion and  help  of  the  world.  It  is  a  fatal  mistake 
to  press  on  a  child's  development,  in  order  to 
force  those  early  fruits,  which  are  fair  to  look 
upon,  but  which  quickly  fade.  A  child's  piety  is 
one  thing,  a  child's  imitation  of  a  man's  or  a 


Education,  147 

woman's  is  anotlier.  I  always  tremble  wlien  I 
hear  of  those  wondrously  sage  reflections  and 
"  good  "  actions,  which  Christian  parents  of  a  cer- 
tain class  delight  to  narrates  I  fear  lest  the  stem 
which  bears  snch  untimely  bnds  should  grow  thin 
and  sickly,  and  yield  leaves  only,  when  it  should 
be  bringing  forth  flowers  and  fruit.  In  a  true 
Christian  home,  where  the  parents  are  taught  of 
God,  the  parents'  authority  would  long  be  to  the 
child  as  the  divine  authority,  and  the  dawn  would 
brighten  very  slowly  into  the  day.  The  time 
comes  when  the  child  begins  to  feel  for  some 
greater  one  behind  the  parent,  and  becomes  con- 
scious of  the  burdens  and  perplexities  of  life. 
Then  let  the  parent  produce  his  higher  lessons, 
remembering  always  that  it  is  as  light,  as  life,  as 
love,  that  the  Lord  reveals  Himself  to  the  soul 
and  to  the  world.  "Were  there  more  of  this  light 
and  joy  of  the  Lord  in  our  Christian  teaching,  we 
might  not  have  to  mourn  so  constantly  that  the 
children  of  Christian  households  forsake  Him,  as 
though  His  names  were  darkness,  terror,  and 
death. 

And  well  is  it  for  us,  in  all  our  intercourse 
with  and  influence  on  our  children,  to  remind 
ourselves,  that  there  is  One  who  holds  their  best 


148  The  Home  Life. 

interests  yet  dearer  than  we  can  liold  tliem ;  and 
whose  stake  is  yet  more  momentous  than  ours  in 
the  future  of  their  life.  He  watches  their  every 
step  wdth  the  most  untiring  vigilance,  and  shields 
their  unguarded  hours  with  the  most  jealous  and 
tender  care.  He  is  nearer  than  their  own  thoughts 
to  the  spring  of  their  actions,  and  haunts,  as  no 
man,  no  angel,  no  devil  can  haunt,  the  innermost 
sanctuary  of  their  life.  His  love  for  them.  His 
stake  in  them.  His  hope  of  them,  has  Calvary  for 
its  only  measure ;  and  He  wields  all  the  resources 
of  divine  power  and  wisdom  to  wrest  them  from 
the  hand  that  would  drag  them  to  destruction, 
and  to  present  them  faultless,  with  us,  in  His  own 
likeness,  to  His  own  eternal  joy  and  triumph, 
in  "  the  day  of  the  manifestation  of  the  sons  of 
God." 


YI. 

THE   NUETUEE  OF  THE  LOED. 


''''Bring  tJiem  up  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the 
Lord.''"' — Eph.  vi.  4. 


In  my  last  discourse  I  dwelt  on  the  funda- 
mental principle  of  a  Christian  education,  the 
drawing  forth  and  instructing  the  consciousness 
that  Christ  is  with,  is  in,  the  child.  Christ  the 
light,  an  element  of  help,  of  joy ;  not  as  some 
parents  systematically  present  Him,  an  element 
of  gloom  and  dread.  Let  children  know  Him  as 
the  inspiration  of  their  young  efforts  of  duty,  as 
their  strength  in  their  struggle  against  sin ;  as  their 
sympathetic  friend  in  all  their  dreary  defeats  and 
failures,  nearer  than  their  own  consciousness  to  the 
springs  of  their  thought  and  life.  A  Lord  at 
hand  and  not  afar  off,  within  and  not  beneath  or 
above ;  taking  intimate  and  personal  part  in  the 
action  of  their  life  drama,  from  the  very  dawn- 


150  TJie  Home  Life. 

ings  of  consciousness;  witnessing,  pleading,  and 
striving,  with  boundless  long-suffering  within. 

You  have  neither  to  take  them  to  Christ  nor 
to  bring  Christ  to  them.  It  may  sound  like  a 
paradox,  but  I  believe  that  the  main  reason  why 
so  many  children  of  Christian  households  grow 
up  inwardly  ignorant  of  the  Saviour,  is  that  they 
have  been  so  sedulously  taught  to  seek  Him. 
They  should  learn  that  He  has  sought  them,  and 
that  He  is  there  at  the  door  of  their  hearts,  yea, 
within  the  door,  waiting  only  to  be  recognised 
and  welcomed  with  love.  The  gospel  is  not,  "  Go 
forth  to  seek  Christ  and  He  will  meet  you."  The 
words,  "  Ask^  and  ye  shall  receive  /  seeli,^  and  ye 
shall  find  I  Tcnock^  and  the  door  shall  he  opened 
unto  you^''  were  spoken  to  men  by  One,  who  had 
come  all  the  way  from  a  heavenly  throne  that  He 
might  place  Himself  in  their  midst.  He  was  seek- 
ing them^  asking  them^  and  knocking  at  the  door 
of  their  hearts,  that  He  might  enter  royally  as 
of  right  and  take  up  His  abode.  Tell  them  of  a 
God  who  needs  to  be  appeased,  of  a  Saviour  who 
waits  to  be  moved  to  intercession,  to  plead  the 
power  of  His  blood  on  their  behalf,  and  salvation 
is  at  once  made  to  appear  to  them  a  hard,  far  off, 
and  doubtful  thing.     We  know  nothing  of  a  God 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord,  151 

needing  to  be  appeased.  We  only  hear  of  an 
atonement  tlirougli  the  Lord  who  has  made  the 
atonement ;  we  only  hear  of  the  need  of  reconcil- 
iation through  a  God  who  is  reconciled ;  we  only 
learn  the  value  of  intercession  through  a  Saviour 
who  is  interceding,  and  who,  while  we  were  yet 
rebels,  as  careless  of  His  love  as  the  brutes,  gave 
His  life  for  us,  that  His  intercession  might  have 
power  to  save. 

If  we  would  but  begin  with  our  children 
where  God  begins  with  us,  it  might  go  better  with 
them.  "  The  word  is  nigh  thee,  in  thy  mouth  cmd 
in  thy  hea/rtP  Look  within.  In  the  battle  which 
is  raging  even  in  thy  young  heart,  every  high 
thought,  every  holy  purpose,  every  heavenward 
aspiration,  is  the  work  of  His  love  for  thee ;  and 
every  base  thought,  every  impure  passion,  every 
worldly  purpose,  is  the  work  of  His  enemy  in 
thee,  striving  to  pluck  thee  out  of  His  hand.  I 
think  that  this  education  of  the  consciousness  to 
recognise  the  present  Christ,  the  inward  light 
that  lighteth  every  man,  and  which  shines  very 
brightly  in  children's  hearts,  would  lend  dignity 
and  energy  to  the  moral  struggle  which  begins 
with  the  first  stirrings  of  freedom,  and  would 
wrest  one  mighty  weapon  of  destruction  out  of 


152  The  Home  Life. 

the  adversary's  hand.  There  is  nothing  worse  for 
the  child  than  to  feel  that  God  is  far  oiT,  and  can- 
not care  much  about  the  battle  of  a  young  life ; 
and  that  it  matters  little  to  Him  or  to  any  one 
what  a  child  may  think  or  do.  It  matters  every- 
thing. From  the  first  moment  of  consciousness 
the  Lord  has  been  with  you,  young  soldier ;  learn 
to  parade  your  soul  before  Him,  and  to  answer  to 
your  name. 

And  to  me  this  seems  to  be  the  only  shield  of 
the  parent  from  what  would  else  be  a  crushing 
burden  of  care.  If  we  are  to  be  at  the  main 
charge  of  this  ministry,  and  if  our  influence  is  the 
chief  educating  power,  then,  as  I  have  said,  alas ! 
for  us,  and  alas !  for  the  child.  As  Jesus  bore 
witness  of  the  Father,  so  we  have  to  bear  witness 
of  the  Saviour.  If  we  bear  witness  of  ourselves, 
of  our  private  ideas  of  what  a  child  should  grow 
to  be,  our  own  image  of  goodness,  purity,  and 
truth,  we  may  chance  to  see  the  little  ones  on 
whom  we  spend  our  wealth  of  effort  gi'owing  into 
an  image  from  which  we  shrink  back  with  dread. 
I  have  seen  it  again  and  again.  I  have  seen  par- 
ents who  had  striven  earnestly  and  with  much 
self-denial  to  mould-  their  children  to  an  image 
which  should  satisfy  their  parental  joy  and  pride. 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.        ■     153 

left  in  their  old  age  to  moan  in  bitterness  of  soul 
over  the  wreck  of  all  their  hopes.  While  little 
ones,  trained  early  to  recognise  joyously  the  dawn- 
ings  of  a  divine  light  and  the  stirrings  of  a  divine 
life  within,  drawn  out  to  realise  their  divine  rela- 
tions, and  to  cry  with  a  child's  frank  heart,  "  Fa- 
ther, Father,"  in  the  ear  of  God,  left  free  to  un- 
fold their  native  faculty  and  tendency  under  the 
eye  and  hand  of  a  parent  whose  supreme  concern 
was  to  know  and  to  do  His  will,  grow  up  in  a  fair 
and  shapely  adolescence,  and  into  a  maturity  rich 
with  noble  and  abundant  fruit. 

But  what,  upon  this  principle,  is  the  true  field 
of  a  parent's  duty  ?  If  Christ  is  with  the  child, 
nearer  than  the  parent,  with  power  to  reach  the 
inner  ear  and  to  touch  the  inner  springs,  the  par- 
ent's influence  seems  to  fade  into  feebleness ;  it 
may  help  in  some  small  measure,  but  it  has  no 
essential  power.  But  it  is  the  same  with  educa- 
tion as  with  everything  else ;  man's  power  is  that 
of  the  fellow-worker,  the  fellow-helper  with  God. 
In  every  field  of  human  activity  in  which  the 
higher  human  faculties  find  play,  indeed  in  every 
region  of  activity,  the  power  is  of  God.  In  every 
work,  the  essential  power,  the  masculine  power, 
is  with  Him.  "  It  is  the  Lord  thy  God  w^ho  giv- 
7* 


154:    •  The  Home  Life. 

eth  tliee  tliis  power  to  get  wealtli."     Tlie  intelli- 
gence, energy,  and  patience  bj  which  men  win 
great  successes,  are  ever  fanned  and  kept  at  a 
white  heat  by  the  breath  of  God.     In  Him  we 
live.     If  His  breath  kindles  the  flame  of  life,  the 
glow  passes  swiftly  through  every  pulse  and  or- 
gan, and  energises  them ;  if  He  withholds  His  in- 
spiration they  fail  and  die.     As  we  rise  into  the 
higher  spheres  of  work,  the  energising  breath  of 
God  becomes  more  palpably  the  condition  of  all 
noble  and  fruitful  activity.     Moses,  David,  Isaiah, 
Paul,  were  from  one  point  of  view  the  most  de- 
pendent thinkers  and  actors  who  have  ever  played 
their  part  in  the  theatre  of  history.     "  And  Moses 
said  unto  the  Lord^  0  my  Lord^  I  am  not  elo- 
quent, neither  heretofore,   nor  since   Thou  hast 
sjpoTcen  unto  Thy  servant :  hut  I  am  slow  of  sjpeech, 
and  of  a  slow  tongue.     And  the  Lord  said  unto 
him,  Who  hath  made  man^s  mouth  f  or  who  mak- 
eth  the  duml),  or  deaf  or  the  seeing,  or  the  Mind  f 
have  not  I  the  Lord?    Now  therefore  go,  and  1 
loill  he  with  thy  mouth,  and  teach  thee  what  thou 
shalt  say  (Exod.  iv.  10-12). 

'^And  lest  L  should  he  exalted  above  measure 
through  the  abundance  of  the  revelations,  tJiere 
was  given  to  me  a  thorn  in  the  flesh,  the  messen- 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord,  155 

ger  of  Satan  to  huffet  me,  lest  I  should  he  exalted 
above  ^tneasure.  For  this  thing  Ih^sought  the  Lord 
thrice,  that  it  might  dejpart  from  me.  And  He 
said  unto  me,  My  grace  is  sufficient  for  thee  :  for 
My  strength  is  made  perfect  in  weakness.  Most 
gladly  therefore  will  L  rather  glory  in  my  infirm- 
ities, that  the  power  of  Christ  may  rest  upon  me. 
Therefore  L  take  pleasure  in  infirmities,  in  re- 
proaches, in  necessities,  in  persecutions,  in  dis- 
tresses, for  Chrises  saJce :  for  when  L  am  weak, 
then  am  L  strong  "  (2  Cor.  xii.  Y-10). 

"' L am  crucified  with  Christ:  nevertheless  1 
live  /  yet  not  L,  hut  Christ  liveth  in  me  ;  and  the 
life  which  L  now  live  in  the  fiesh,  L  live  hy  the 
faith  of  the  Son  of  God,  who  loved  me,  and  goA^e 
Himself  for  me  "  (Gal.  ii.  20). 

''And  ye  shall  he  hrought  hefore  governors  and 
kings  for  My  sake,  for  a  testimony  against  them 
and  the  Gentiles.  But  when  they  deliver  yoio  up, 
take  no  thought  how  nor  what  ye  shall  speak  / 
for  it  shall  he  given  you  in  that  same  hour  what 
ye  shall  speak.  For  it  is  not  ye  that  speak,  hut 
the  Spirit  of  your  Father  which  speaketh  in  you  " 
(Matt.  X.  18-20). 

And  yet  these  were  the  very  highest  and  freest 
expressions  of  human  thought  and  will  which  the 


156  The  Home  Life, 

world  has  ever  witnessed.  [Nfo  men  have  ever 
spoken  so  freely  for  God,  yea,  and  to  God,  as 
these  men  who  were  completely  dependent  on  EQs 
inspiration.  Xone  have  acted  so  boldly,  so  grand- 
ly, in  their  human  freedom,  as  those  who  took 
the  suggestion  of  their  every  movement  from  the 
touch  of  His  hand  and  the  glance  of  His  eye. 
And  the  reason  is  not  diflicult  to  discover.  Man's 
nature  moves  in  its  fullest  liberty,  and  touches 
the  height  of  its  possibilities,  only  when  it  is  in 
perfect  oneness  with  the  mind  and  the  will  of  God. 
The  more  completely  God  enters  into  it,  the  more 
nearly  does  it  grow  to  the  fulness  of  its  native 
dignity  and  power.  Man  was  made  to  be  the  fel- 
low-worker with  the  Lord ;  the  fellow-worker,  as 
the  woman  works  with  man  in  the  conduct  of  the 
home.  "  The  hride  the  LarnFs  wife^''  describes 
humanity  under  its  highest  possible  conditions. 
Its  freedom  is  the  freedom  which  is  possible  in 
such  imion,  the  freedom  of  perfect  sympathy  and 
perfect  love. 

And  thus  the  parents  are  Christ's  co-workers 
in  the  nurture  and  culture  of  their  little  ones. 
It  would  be  but  partial  truth  to  say  that  the  su- 
preme relation  of  the  child  is  to  Christ,  and  that 
the  parent's  influence  is  but  a  feather's  weight  in 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord,  15Y 

the  scale.  The  parent's  influence  is  part  of  Christ's 
influence ;  it  is  of  His  making  and  of  His  main- 
taining ;  and  He  is  just  robbed  as  it  wei;e  of  a  vi- 
tal organ,  if  a  parent  despises  or  even  thinks  light- 
ly of  this  fellow-helping  with  Him.  Throw 
yourself  into  the  duty  with  all  the  zeal  and  ener- 
gy which  the  thought  of  all  that  is  hanging  on 
your  efibrt,  for  yourself,  for  your  child,  and  for 
God,  can  inspire,  and  you  will  lend  to  the  Master 
the  most  precious  instrument  that  the  universe 
could  furnish  for  His  work ;  while  you  may  keep 
the  instrument  pure  and  keen,  and  meet  for  the 
Master's  use,  by  remembering  that  your  work  is 
to  bear  witness  for  Him  who  is  ever  at  work  with- 
in, and  to  draw  forth  the  child's  consciousness  that 
He  is  there.  The  more  you  believe  in  Christ's 
presence  with  your  little  one,  the  more,  did  you 
understand  it  rightly,  would  you  feel  your  minis- 
try to  be  essential  to  a  true  nurture  and  admoni- 
tion in  the  Lord.  The  Lord  is  with  you^  as  well 
as  with  your  little  one ;  and  it  is  through  you 
alone  that  He  can  complete  His  work.  To  this 
concert  of  spirit  He  is  ever  moving  you.  His 
zeal  for  your  little  one  works  through  you  as  its 
chief  organ.  In  truth,  the  Incarnation  is  a  fact 
ever  living,  and  it  ever  finds  new  manifestations. 


168  The  Borne  Life. 

God  in  man,  man  in  God,  is  tlie  key  to  the  whole 
mystery  of  life. 

I  have  said  that  nearer  than  all  the  tones  and 
touches  of  the  creation,  far  nearer,  are  the  YDices 
of  the  home.  God  is  educating  the  child  by  all 
the  objects  with  which  He  has  surrounded  it, 
drawing  forth  its  apprehension,  and  widening 
its  horizon.  And  He  ever  keeps  objects  on  the 
dim  bounds  of  that  horizon  to  stimulate  its  effort. 
Whatever  the  child  may  see  so  as  to  know,  God 
always  cares  that  there  shall  be  that  which  it 
faintly  sees  and  hardly  knows;  so  that  a  con- 
stant strain  of  effort  is  kept  up,  expanding  and 
cultivating  the  powers.  But  man's  influence  is 
supreme.  Nature  cannot  close  the  heart  to  man, 
but  man  may  close  the  heart  to  nature.  The  pas- 
sionate, spoilt  child  of .  a  corrupt  society,  who 
pined  "  for  a  desert  as  his  dwelling-place,"  that  he 
might  "  all  forget  the  human  race,"  must  have 
"  one  fair  spirit  for  his  minister."  And  it  is  ever 
thus.  Man  is  and  must  be  the  supreme  object  to 
man.  I  doubt  if  affection  so  tender  and  so  pure 
ever  dwelt  in  human  hearts,  as  that  which  the 
men  who  had  cut  themselves  off  from  the  world 
and  its  claims  and  loves,  cherished  towards  the 
brethren  of  their  monastery,  to  whom  they  knit 


i 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  159 

their  souls.  Let  these  words  of  tlie  wise  and 
good  Anselm,  whicli  lie  addressed  to  a  brother 
monk,  bear  witness  to  the  need  which,  even  in 
the  cloister,  man  has  of  man ; — "  Thou  knewest 
how  much  I  love  thee,  but  I  knew  it  not.  He 
who  has  separated  us  has  alone  instructed  me 
how  dear  ^o  me  thou  wert.  ITo,  I  knew  not  be- 
fore the  experience  of  thy  absence  how  sweet  it 
was  to  have  thee,  how  bitter  to  have  thee  not. 
Thou  hast  another  friend  whom  thou  hast  loved 
as  much  or  more  than  me,  to  console  thee,  but  I 
have  no  longer  thee — thee !  thee !  thou  under- 
standest  ?  and  nothing  to  replace  thee.  Thou 
hast  thy  consolers,  but  I  have  only  my  wound. 
Those  who  rejoice  in  the  possession  of  thee  may 
perhaps  be  offended  by  what  I  say.  Ah !  let 
them  content  themselves  with  their  joy,  and  per- 
mit me  to  weep  for  him  whom  I  ever  love." 

Man  must  have  man  to  cleave  to ;  and  from 
man  all  his  highest  directing  and  stimulating  in- 
fluences come.  It  is  in  the  form  of  man  that 
God  claims  the  supreme  rule  over  the  world. 
And  the  home  influence  must  inevitably  be  the 
dominant  in  the  formation  of  character,  or,  where 
there  is  unusual  native  strength,  in  its  direction 
and  development.     And  there,  too,  it  is  chiefly 


160  The  Home  Life. 

settled  whether  it  shall  be  a  spi-ing  of  joy  or  of 
bitterness  to  its  possessor  through  life. 

Many  a  noble  gift,  whose  nobleness  cannot  be 
quite  destroyed,  even  by  the  worst  home  influ- 
ences, gets  set  so  awry,  or  so  poisoned  in  the 
springs,  that  it  becomes  mainly  a  sorrow  to  the 
man  who  is  endowed  with  it,  and  to  the  world 
into  which  God  sent  it  forth  to  be  a  benediction. 
Everything  depends  on  the  culture  of  the  whole 
nature.  You  cannot  cultivate  a  branch  or  a 
limb  fairly,  except  through  the  trunk  which  bears 
it.  If  the  whole  nature  is  suffered  to  grow  up 
warped,  deformed,  embittered,  gifts,  which  might 
have  traversed  a  wide  orbit  of  blessing,  become 
charged  with  a  malignant  energy,  and  live  on, 
either  as  prodigies  to  startle,  or  as  plagues  to  tor- 
ment mankind.  The  home  is  mainly  responsible 
for  the  morale  of  the  men  and  women  who  are  to 
cany  on  the  development  of  society.  And  did 
I  need  any  argument  to  strengthen  the  grounds 
of  my  belief  in  Him  who  has  the  world's  desti- 
nies in  a  Father's  charge,  I  should  find  it  in  the 
fact,  that  in  spite  of  all  that  man  does  in  human 
homes,  in  every  generation,  to  poison  human  life 
in  its  very  springs,  there  still  is  developement. 
Man  holds  on  his  path  of  progress ;  he  goes  from 


Tlie  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  161 

strength  to  strength  led  by  an  unseen  l^and,  and 
triumphs  over  his  own  folly  and  weakness  through 
the  sustaining  wisdom  and  energy  of  God. 

I  have  dwelt  at  length  on  what  seems  to  me 
to  be  the  first  step  in  all  true  education,  the  start- 
ing point  of  the  higher  life.  The  next  step  con- 
cerns the  conscious  relationship  of  the  young  child 
to  Christ,  the  mystery  .of  its  moral  nature,  the  ex- 
perience of  transgression,  and  its  fruits,  in  an  al- 
tered relation  to  the  Father  of  Spirits,  to  man, 
and  to  the  world.  How,  in  a  well-ordered  Chris- 
tian home,  shall  the  parent  deal  with  the  question 
of  sin  %  And  here,  as  ever,  the  true  course  seems 
to  be  between  two  pernicious  extremes.  Let  it 
alone,  some  say ;  why  trouble  the  child  with  dark 
fancies,  and  teach  it  to  see  some  dreadful  evil  in 
its  little  innocent  half-conscious  words  and  works  ? 
There  is  a  school  of  philosophic  religionists  who 
would  have  us  deal  lightly  with  this  whole  ques- 
tion of  sin.  They  believe  that  men  are  made  ten 
times  worse  than  they  would  othej'wise  be,  by 
being  tormented  about  their  sins  by  the  priests. 
Let  them  alone  to  the  teaching  of  experience, 
they  say ;  the  burnt  child  dreads  the  fire ;  they 
will  learn  in  time  that  the  pleasure  is  not  worth 
the  pain,  and  live  sober,  peaceful,  and  sensible 


162  The  Home  Life. 

lives.  This  teacliing  of  tlie  priest,  we  are  told, 
wakens  a  spirit  of  defiance ;  men  sin  tlie  harder 
for  it,  and  a  bitter  malignant  temper  gets  posses- 
sion of  them.  Treat  transgression  as  having  its 
origin  mainly  in  ignorance,  use  wise  discipline, 
sharp,  if  need  be,  to  correct  it ;  but  be  very  care- 
ful not  to  cloud  the  bright  heaven  of  a  young 
child's  life,  by  gloomy  pictures  of  its  moral  con- 
dition and  relations  with  the  Supreme. 

Thus  one  school  argues.     There  are  those,  on 
the  other  hand,  who  think  that  the  picture  can 
hardly  be  painted  black  enough.      They  would 
have  us  impress  upon  the  child  a  very  vivid  and 
terrible  conviction  of  its  sinful  state,  and  of  its 
peril  if  cut  off,  under  the  idea  of  driving  it  to 
Christ  in  the  extremity  of  its  agony,  that  it  might 
be  timely  sheltered  within  His  fold.     Some  of  us 
have  seen  much  of  this  method,  and  have  marked 
its  results.     The  child,  being  already  within  the 
fold  of  the  Good  Shepherd  (and  we  may  presume 
that  those  whom  He  gathered  in  His  arms  are  not 
excluded  from  His  fold),  is  in  grave  danger  of 
being  driven  out  of  it  again,  by  these  terrible 
pictures   of  its   condition,  danger,   and  possible 
doom.      "Teach  them   that  they  are  sinners, — 
teach  them  that  they  are  sinners, — teach  them 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  163 

that  they  are  sinners,"  reiterated  a  venerable  and 
experienced  minister  once,  as  the  first,  second, 
and  third  head  of  a  Christian  education.  And 
he  had  written  a  book  on  "  Persuasives  to  Early 
Piety ! " 

But  I  hold  more  with  him  than  with  the  oppo- 
site party  after  all ;  if  you  understand,  as  I  think 
that  he  did  not  understand,  what  the  teaching 
means.  You  see  the  difference  between  teaching 
a  child  as  a  first  lesson  that  he  is  a  sinner,  and 
watching  earnestly  for  the  fit  occasion  to  unfold 
to  him  the  nature  and  tendencies  of  that  evil,  the 
consciousness  of  which  has  become  already  devel- 
oped within.  "We  would  keep  the  cloud  out  of 
the  clear  heaven  of  their  young  lives  gladly 
enough,  but,  alas !  the  devil  is  too  busy.  The 
cloud  will  gather,  and  will  burst  in  a  tempest, 
if  we  have  not  found  the  conductors  which  will 
carry  it^  malign  fire  harmlessly  away.  "We  can- 
not afford  to  make  light  of  transgression.  There 
is  that  within  the  child  which  cannot  make  light 
of  it.  We  may  as  well  watch  quietly  a  tumour 
gathering  on  his  body,  which  will  cripple  him  for 
life.  Grapple  with  the  thing  we  must,  and  with 
the  reality  of  the  thing.     The  fang  is  venomous, 


164  The  Home  Life. 

and  unless  we  can  neutralise  tlie  poison,  the  wound 
is  death. 

I  think  that  I  would  not  yield  to  the  sternest 
theologian  of  the  sternest  school,  in  the  firmness 
with  which  I  hold  two  articles  of  his  creed,  that 
all  that  is  good  is  of  God,  on  the  one  hand,  and 
that  sin  is  the  universal,  deadly,  damning  mis- 
chief in  man,  on  the  other.  Deal  with  it  you 
must,  and  early ;  but  again  I  plead,  deal  with  it 
as  the  fellow-helper  with  God,  watching  His 
workings  and  interpreting  them  to  the  child. 
You  have  not  to  teach  the  child  that  he  is  a  sin- 
ner; God  has  to  teach  it,  and  you  have  to  watch 
His  method  and  come  in  to  His  aid.  If  a  young 
child,  whose  consciousness  is  but  feebly  cognizant 
of  the  mingled  elements  of  which  it  is  composed, 
be  diligently  taught  to  repeat  that  he  is  a  sinner, 
and  that  God  hates  sin  and  must  punish  sin,  then, 
as  the  intelligence  developes,  there  can  be  but 
one  result, — the  child  will  grow  up  inevitably  into 
distrust,  and  even  dread  of  God.  You  may  talk 
as  jou  will  of  God's  love,  and  of  the  gift  of  that 
love  on  Calvary,  but  the  shock  has  been  given, 
and  the  quiet  trust  and  love,  the  bloom  of  a  child's 
piety,  has  been  destroyed. 

Everything  depends  on  the  first  image  which 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  165 

gets  possession  of  tlie  spirit,  tlie  first  thought  that 
lodges  there.  Is  it  to  be  Christ  or  sin  ?  Let  us 
watch  God's  method.  If  a  child  has  been  taught 
to  recognise  a  light  within,  and  has  learnt  that 
that  light  is  Christ,  and  that  Christ  is  love,  the 
time  will  come,  and  come  soon,  when  it  will  be- 
come conscious  of  a  darkness — of  something  which 
does  not  love  the  light,  and  will  not  face  the  light 
— which  stirs  up  a  conflict  and  makes  a  confu- 
sion within — which  fills  the  soul  with  pain,  and 
sets  it  out  of  tune  with  life  and  with  the  world. 
Those  are  the  seasons  which  a  wise  parent  will 
watch  for,  to  educate  the  consciousness  of  sin. 
There  is  an  experience  within,  a  work  of  God, 
which  needs  interpreting — a  mystery,  which  the 
young  soul  is  incompetent  to  solve.  Words  then 
have  meanings.  Sin,  transgression,  rebellion — 
yes,  the  soul  knows  full  well  what  they  mean.  It 
longs  to  have  them  explained.  It  is  ready  to  hear 
whence  they  spring,  whom  they  wrong,  and  how 
they  may  be  mastered  and  destroyed.  Knowing 
Christ  as  the  inner  light,  the  first  and  chief 
Friend,  the  child  is  ready  to  harbour  the  thought 
of  the  grief  with  which  sin  afilicts  Him,  and  to 
clasp  the  helping  hand  which  He  holds  forth,  that 
it  may  be  saved.     Let  the  field  of  the  child's  con- 


166  The  Home  Life, 

Bciousness  be  bright  witb  tlie  liglit  of  the  living 
Word,  and  every  outburst  of  selfisli  greed  or  pas- 
sion will  sLow  itself  against  that  background  black 
as  night. 

Ah!  would  we  but  study  and  follow  the 
methods  of  God !  Would  we  but  wait  until 
we  see  that  He  is  teaching,  and  then  help,  as 
far  as  we  may,  these  little  ones  to  understand 
the  lessons  which  He  is  impressing  on  their 
hearts ! 

The  next  step  concerns  the  child  and  the 
written  word.  Alas !  what  a  weary  task-book 
the  Bible  is  made  in  many  an  otherwise  genial 
Christian  home !  When  I  see  how  all  its  diviner 
meanings  are  murdered,  as  children  are  taught  to 
spell  out  of  it,  or  trained  to  stand  an  examination 
in  its  facts  and  doctrines,  in  furtherance  of  what 
is  understood  to  be  "  the  religious  element  in  edu- 
cation"— and  if  the  angels  are  ever  present  as 
*'  the  religious  element "  is  being  infused  in  schools, 
one  would  like  to  know  what  they  think  of  it — I 
am  again  filled  with  amazement  at  the  cordial 
faith  in  the  Bible  which  survives  the  process. 
Though,  if  any  are  curious  to  discover  the  hot- 
bed which  forces,  if  not  the  root  which  generates, 
the  most  malignant  unbeHef,  he  may  find  it  in 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  167 

what  passes  among  us  as  the  recognised  process 
of  religious  education. 

And  the  Bible  suffers  under  this  process  in 
two  ways.  Its  history  is  dealt  with  as  if  it  were 
not  history ;  and  its  truth  as  if  it  were  dead  and 
not  vital  truth.  Its  history  gets  studied  mainly 
for  its  moral  lessons,  and  the  historic  interest 
fades  out  of  it.  Surely  it  is  more  full  of  moral 
lessons  than  any  history  in  the  world ;  but  this 
depends  on  the  moral  fulness  of  the  life  which 
it  pourtrays.  The  moral  lessons  of  any  book 
may  be  measured  by  the  largeness  and  vigour  of 
the  life  which  it  sets  forth ;  which  if  our  writers 
of  "  tales  with  moral  lessons,"  for  children,  would 
but  remember,  they  would  spare  the  poor  young 
things  which  have  to  browse  in  their  pastures 
much  flatulent  vacuity  of  mind  and  spirit,  end- 
ing too  often  in  entire  incapacity. for  the  higher 
business  of  life. 

The  Old  Testament  as  history,  and  great  part 
of  it  is  history,  is  the  most  valuable  ancient  docu- 
ment in  the  world.  The  history  of  the  free  Jew- 
ish people — their  struggle  with  the  great  oriental 
despotisms,  and  the  power  which,  in  virtue  of  a 
superior  political  and  moral  life,  they  were  able 
to  exert  upon  them  even  in  captivity — is  as  rich 


168  The  Home  Life, 

in  interest  as  the  history  of  tlie  free  Grecian  peo- 
ples, and  tlieir  victorious  struggle  against  the 
same  despotisms  at  a  later  period  of  their  devel- 
opment, or  rather  of  their  decay.  And  what  is 
there  in  ancient  literature  comparable  with  the 
history  of  David  ?  Where  is  the  tale  so  rich  in 
human  interest,  pathos,  tenderness,  courage,  ad- 
venture, and  brilliant  achievement  in  policy  and 
war  ?  Children  would  read  it  gladly,  and  suck 
in  its  lessons  as  the  glow  of  a  summer  noon,  if  we 
would  leave  them  alone  to  pore  over  it  as  a  his- 
tory ;  and  not  cut  it  up  into  portions,  and  label 
them  with  morals,  and  do  all  that  we  can  to  per- 
suade them  that  they  are  not  to  take  the  same 
enjoyment  in  it,  that  they  take  in  any  other  an- 
cient tale  of  brilliant  and  romantic  life.  It  is 
grand  and  noble  history,  the  whole  historic  Old 
Testament;  and  if  we  would  but  let  our  little 
ones  bring  their  fresh  young  appetites  to  bear 
upon  it,  they  would  have  that  lodged  within 
them  which  would  unlock  for  them  the  inner 
meaning  of  all  the  histories  which  they  may  be 
called  upon  to  study — the  key,  in  a  word,  to  the 
universal  history  of  man. 

The  division  into  chapters  and  verses  is  ad- 
mirably convenient  for  lessons,  but  is  fatal  to  vi- 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  169 

tal  interest  in  the  narratives.  ITor  do  paragraph 
Bibles  much  mend  the  matter.  The  mischief  is 
moral,  and  not  mechanical-;  and  this  method  of 
reading  the  Bible  is  so  thoroughly  wrought  into 
us  by  long  habit,  that  young  minds  are  rather 
confused  than  helped  by  mere  mechanical  redis- 
tributions of  the  text.  For  I  am  not  speaking 
altogether  of  the  chapters  and  verses  which  the 
printer  makes  for  us,  but  rather  of  the  habit  of 
piecing  the  work  out  into  bits,  each  with  a  moral 
lesson  to  it,  which  good  people  carry  about  with 
them  as  prepared  spiritual  food ;  the  teaching  of 
which  to  their  children,  with  the  proper  moral 
stimulus  or  sting  appended,  they  regard  as  an  es- 
sential element  of  the  nurture  and  admonition  of 
the  Lord. 

And  when  we  come  to  the  higher  function  of 
the  Bible,  the  case  is  sadder  still.  Just  as  we 
will  not  wait  for  God  to  begin  the  teaching  of 
young  hearts  about  sin,  so  we  will  not  wait  for 
God  to  show  to  them  tlje  worth  and  the  power 
of  His  word.  We  start  at  once  by  insisting  on 
claims  for  it  which  it  never  urges  for  itself.  Its 
absolute  authority,  its  plenary  inspiration,  it  nev- 
er asserts  ;  it  leaves  us  to  discover  them  as  we  dis- 
cover the  sun,  and  turn  to  it  for  light  and  fire. 


170  The  Home  Life, 

The  Bible,  like  the  Master,  speaks  with  authority, 
because  so  unlike  the  scribes ;  because  the  word 
spoken  is  so  full  of  heavenly  light  and  love,  that 
men  can  see  the  Divine  mark  on  it  and  rejoice. 
We  do  our  very  best  to  make  the  Bible  speak  aa 
the  scribes,  who  began  by  claiming  authority, 
and  demanded  on  that  ground  the  acceptance  of 
their  truth.  God  asks  no  acceptance  of  His  gifts 
but  such  as  their  worth  may  win  for  them.  Oh  ! 
we  of  little  faith,  why  cannot  we  trust  His  book 
to  His  own  method,  and  let  the  light  and  the  life 
with  which  He  has  freely  charged  it,  glow  and 
quicken  through  the  world  ?  What  the  Bible  su- 
premely wants  is  freedom.  "  You  must  think 
thus  and  thus  about  it,  and  about  its  every  word," 
say  the  divines.  "  Leave  it  free  to  win  its  rever- 
ence," we  answer;  "there  is  light  there  bright 
enough  to  be  seen  without  your  glasses,  and  pow- 
er enough  to  be  only  hampered  with  your  offi- 
cious hand." 

And  be  sure  that  no  amount  of  demonstration 
of  its  divine  origin  and  authority,  no  reiteration 
of  its  claims,  will  win  for  it  yom'  child's  homage. 
Formal  reverence,  such  as  men  pay  to  scribes? 
you  can  compel,  but  true  homage,  mere  author- 
ity never  wins.     The  Bible  is  God's  book  to  the 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord,  lYl 

child,  precisely  in  the  measure  in  which  his  sym- 
pathy is  drawn  forth  to  it,  as  presenting  some 
outward  image  of  his  inner  life.  If  he  finds  the 
key  there  which  unlocks  the  wards  of  his  experi- 
ence ;  if  he  finds  the  truth  there  which  casts  a 
flood  of  light  on  the  dark,  and  a  dew  of  comfort 
on  the  sad  passages  of  his  life, — the  Bible  has 
found  the  child,  not  the  child  the  Bible,  and  that 
finding  never  fails.  If  you  can  connect  the  outer 
word  in  the  Book  with  the  inner  word  in  the  life, 
and  teach  your  child  to  seek  it,  not  for  formal  les- 
sons, not  for  knowledge  of  sacred  things  only,  not 
for  Sunday  reading,  but  for  real  light  in  real 
darkness,  real  comfort  in  real  sorrow,  real  help 
in  real  need, — you  have  made  the  Bible  the  ma» 
of  his  counsel  until  death.  You  have  rendered 
his  belief  of  the  Bible  absolutely  proof  against 
every  effort  of  the  adversary  to  undermine  it. 
A  thousand  critics  may  assail  its  most  sacred  pas- 
sages, it  troubles  him  not ;  for  him  its  light  shines 
on,  because  it  is  God's  light,  unshorn  of  a  single 
beam. 

The  last  point  on  which  I  dwell  is  the  educa- 
tion of  the  eye,  and  the  whole  seeing  faculty  of 
the  child,  to  behold  the  wonderful  works  of  God. 

A  great  part,  and  a  much  neglected  part  of 


172  The  Home  Life.       • 

the  home  education,  concerns  the  faculties  of  ob- 
servation, the  drawing  them  out  to  aj)prehend  the 
rich  world  of  wonder  and  splendour  which  God 
has  spread  around  even  the  basest  beggar's  child. 
A  noted  evangelical  divine  has  recently  been 
agitating  the  question,  doubtfully  and  with  the 
amount  of  wisdom  to  which  popular  preachers 
have  accustomed  us,  whether  it  is  worth  while  to 
study  anything  closely  but  the  word  of  God,  or 
what  throws  light  on  the  word  of  God.  Again  I 
should  be  disposed  to  sympathise  with  his  doubts, 
upon  a  true  understanding  of  what  the  study  of 
the  divine  word  implies.  The  best  way  to  blind 
ourselves  to  the  sunlight  is  to  stare  at  it ;  and  the 
•best  way  to  miss  the  light  which  is  in  the  divine 
word  is  to  look  at  nothing  else.  To  read  nothing 
but  the  Bible  and  books  about  the  Bible,  is  the 
surest  way  to  stint  its  blessing.  The  Bible  is 
larger  than  our  faculties  at  their  fullest  expansion. 
The  higher  their  culture,  the  wider  their  range 
of  vision,  the  more  of  its  truth  they  will  be  able 
to  take  in.  In  my  small  sphere,  I  am  in  the 
habit,  as  my  congregation  know  very  well,  of 
studying  each  year  some  secular  theme,  some  as- 
pect of  the  creation,  or  some  era  of  history,  and 
bringing  the  results  before  them  in  a  course  of 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  1T3 

lectures  on  tlie  subject.  I  call  it  secular,  but  to 
me  it  is  most  sacred.  I  do  it  distinctly  tliat  I 
may  understand  tlie  Bible  better,  and  be  more 
fitted  for  my  spiritual  work ;  that  I  may  know 
God's  word  and  God  himself  more  fully,  by  tak- 
ing a  wider  view  of  what  God  has  done  in  the 
material  and  human  worlds.  J^ever  fear  that  the 
widest  culture  which  you  can  give  your  children 
will  imperil  the  supremacy  of  the  word  of  God. 
If  you  have  taught  them  the  true  secret  of  its 
value,  and  shown  to  them  the  true  spring  of  its 
power,  whatever  stars  of  truth  they  may  discover, 
their  sun  will  never  be  eclipsed. 

But  teach  them  from  the  first  to  use  their  eyes 
and  hands  upon  the  world  around  them,  for  there- 
fore was  it  sent.  It  exists  for  the  education  of 
these  little  ones,  these  nurselings  of  God,  these 
infants  of  heaven.  And  our  method  is  too  often 
a  shameful  neglect  of  the  riches  and  splendours 
of  the  universe,  which  God  has  fiung  round  our 
daily  paths  with  such  royal  and  lavish  hand. 
What  are  those  glittering  heavens  telling  nightly 
to  the  eager  young  eyes  that  search  their  star- 
sown  depths,  ignorant  of  their  forms  and  motions, 
ignorant  of  those  awful  paths  where  the  great 
Captain  leads  forth  His  flaming  hosts  by  number. 


L 


174  The  Home  Life. 

"  and  telleth  them  all  by  their  names  by  the  great- 
ness of  His  might ;  and  for  that  He  is  strong  in 
power  not  one  faileth  % "  Nor  is  the  dust  under 
our  feet  less  rich  in  teaching,  less  full  of  the 
thoughts  of  God.  The  crystals  of  the  dust  are 
as  wonderful  as  the  constellations.  Yet  but  one 
in  a  myriad  has  ever  learn!;  their  lore,  pored  over 
them  till  they  revealed  their  secrets,  and  told  as 
they  can  teU  the  struggles  of  their  life.  Teach 
your  little  ones  to  sing  with  the  birds,  and  at  mat- 
ins; few  know  the  glory  of  the  dawn.  Teach 
them  to  consider  the  lilies,  how  they  gi*ow,  the 
mountains,  how  they  uprear  their  thrones.  Draw 
out  the  desire  to  observe  and  the  power  to  observe 
the  various  phenomena  of  creation.  It  is  like 
peopling  the  dull  earth  with  living  land  unselfish 
friends. 

I  would  have  every  child  trained  to  take  de- 
light in  some  physical  science  of  which  observa- 
tion is  a  leading  function.  I  would  have  him 
taught  to  search  out  the  thoughts  of  God  in  the 
creation,  that  "the  trivial  round,  the  common 
task,"  may  unveil  to  him  scenes  of  beauty  and 
wonder,  than  which,  may  be,  the  angels  see 
nought  more  wonderful  and  beautiful  w^  there 
beyond  the  stars.      I  think  that  there  must  be 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord,  175 

scenes  on  earth  of  winch,  those  shining  ones  are 
joyful  visitants ;  it  was  not  of  hasty  and  imper- 
fect work,  that  God  said  "  hehold  it  is  very  goodP 
Every  day  the  world  seems  to  me  more  marvel- 
lously beautiful  and  more  exquisitely  wrought; 
and  every  day  increases  my  sorrow  that  I  learnt 
so  little  when  I  was  young,  and  when  the  mem- 
ory easily  freights  itself  with  treasures  with  which 
it  never  parts,  about  the  stars,  the  clouds,  the 
magnetic  streams,  the  rocks,  the  mountains,  the 
birds,  the  flowers,  the  music  that  floods  the  air, 
and  the  dust  that  I  tread  beneath  my  feet.  Open 
the  child's  eye,  as  far  as  lies  in  your  power,  to 
take  in  the  vision.  The  value  of  life  is  measured 
by  the  richness  and  variety  of  .its  experiences. 
Life  ought  to  be  worth  double  to  your  child  what 
It  has  been  worth  to  you.  Your  life  ought  to  be 
bis  vantage  ground,  from  which  through  the  cul- 
ture which  God  has  strengthened  you  to  give  him, 
he  may  gather  in  the  impressions  of  a  far  wider 
world. 

Into  the  departments  of  education  which  fall 
under  the  char^  of  professional  teachers,  I  do 
not  feel  competent  to  enter.  One  word  only  I 
will  say.  I  should  find  it  difficult  to  express  the 
strength  of  my  conviction  of  the  value  of  a  lib- 


176  The  Home  Life. 

eral  education  to  a  youth  destined,  like  the  major- 
ity of  those  whom  I  am  addressing,  to  occupy  his 
manhood  with  commercial  pursuits.  The  study 
of  the  classical  languages  of  antiquity,  and  the 
literature  to  which  the  mastery  of  the  language 
opens  the  way,  is  incomparably  the  finest  instru- 
ment of  intellectual  cultm-e  which  is  within  our 
reach.  Earnestly  would  I  urge  on  every  parent 
the  duty  of  much  effort  and  much  self-denial  to 
give  his  boy,  yes  and  his  girl  too,  some  vision  of 
that  world.  It  is,  like  the  history  of  Thucydides, 
as  he  himself  describes  it,  "  a  possession  for  ever ; " 
it  adds  something  to  the  culture,  which  lifts  the 
life  into  a  higher  sphere. 

But  prudent,  practical  parents  are  prone  to 
question  the  use  of  this  "  dead  "  literature,  and  to 
insist  on  modern,  and  more  immediately  profita- 
ble themes.  Perhaps  its  main  value  lies  in  the 
fact  that  it  has  no  immediate  and  available  use, 
and  is,  therefore,  the  finest  instrument  of  a  liberal 
education.  A  liberal  education  is  that  which 
considers  the  education,  the  drawing  forth  of  the 
faculties,  to  be  the  main  end  (^f  the  discij)line; 
while  an  illiberal  education  is  that  which  asks  for 
results  capable  of  being  put  to  immediate  and 
profitable  use.     Most  earnestly  would  I  plead  for 


The  Nurture  of  the  Lord.  177 

a  longer  and  larger  measure  of  truly  liberal  cul- 
ture, for  tlie  children  who  are  to  play  their  part 
on  the  busy  stage  of  commercial  life.  It  will  give 
them  a  higher  chance  than  you  can  easily  imag- 
ine of  lifting  their  life  to  a  superior  level,  and 
making  it  worth  tenfold  to  themselves  and  to  the 
world.  Believe  that  it  will  repay  a  hundredfold, 
whatever  effort  and  denial  it  may  cost. 

Eesolve  that,  God  helping  you,  you  will,  at 
whatever  sacrifice,  bestow  upon  your  children  the 
gift  of  thoroughly  disciplined  and  developed  pow- 
ers. Give  them  that,  and  take  slight  thought  for 
the  rest.  Educate  them,  draw  them  out  to  their 
full  stature  physically,  mentally,  and  spiritually ; 
and  then  every  farthing  that  you  hoard  for  them 
is  so  much  taken  from  the  value  of  the  priceless 
gift  which  you  have  bestowed.  Lay  up  in  them 
at  any  cost.  It  is  the  parents'  honour  and  di- 
vine privilege  to  toil  and  suffer  for  the  education 
of  his  child.  Grudge  nothing  which  that  may 
cost  you.  Eternity  only  can  reveal  to  you  what 
it  has  been  worth ;  and  eternity  only  will  reveal 
the  curse  of  the  hoards  which  the  "rich  in  this 
world "  lay  up  for  their  children,  and  the  loss  of 
noble  effort  and  disciplined  energy  which  this 
worse  than  idle  provision  has   entailed.      And 


178  The  Home  Life. 

eternity  only  will  unfold  to  you  how  much  of  it 
has  been  laid  up  for  the  devil's  storehouses ;  for 
thither,  I  am  tempted  to  think,  nine-tenths  of  the 
wealth  that  is  hoarded  for  children  finds  its  way 
at  last. 


YII. 

« 

KECEEATIOlSr. 

"  To  every  tiling  tTiere  is  a  season^  and  a  time  to  every  pur- 
pose under  the  heaven.    A  time  to  laugh and  a 

time  to  dance,'''' — Ecoles.  iii.  1,  4. 

Yaeiett  is  tlie  key  to  the  method  of  God  in 
the  management  of  our  lives.  Yarious  influences, 
various  objects,  various  experiences,  various  food. 
Man  is  continent  of  varieties.  He  can  hold  them 
clasped  within  his  unity,  and  live  by  them.  Rob 
him  of  variety,  condemn  him  to  monotony,  in  any 
department  of  his  life,  and  you  either  madden  or 
brutalise  him.  A  rich  variety  of  relations,  scenes, 
and  influences,  is  essential  to  the  complete  and 
healthy  unfolding  of  his  powers. 

I  suppose  that  there  is  no  form  of  death  more 

terrible  than  that  which  a  man  would  suffer  if  he 

were  fed  to  death  on  solid  food.     Fed  to  death  1 

Yes ;  nothing  is  more  easy.     Let  a  man  be  shut 

9* 


180  The  Home  Life. 

np,  and  supplied  with  nothing  but  water  and 
strong  animal  food ;  and,  if  he  is  kept  to  it  long 
enough,  he  will  die  in  horrible  agonies,  a  loath- 
some, ghastly  wreck.  For  a  time,  and  for  a  spe- 
cial purpose — as  when  a  man  is  in  training  for  a 
contest — a  regimen  of  strong  animal  food,  with  a 
•minimum  of  those  lighter  elements  which  'are  re- 
garded as  the  ornaments,  but  which  in  reality  are 
very  important  features  of  a  repast,  may  developer 
a  remarkable  amount  of  muscular  fibre,  and  fit 
him  to  do  the  very  utmost  that  under  any  condi- 
tions could  be  exacted  of  his  frame.  But  if  he 
were  to  keep  up  the  regimen,  month  after  month, 
and  abstain  from  bread,  vegetables,  and  fruit,  the 
strong  frame  would  wither,  as  if  a  hot  blast  had 
swept  through  it  and  dried  up  its  vital  juices. 
The  joints  and  bands  of  the  system  would  become 
relaxed,  the  limbs  would  move  wearily ;  a  dull, 
wearing,  and  ultimately  agonising  pain  would 
seize  them ;  the  teeth  would  fall  out  of  the  gums, 
the  eyes  would  strain  out  of  the  sockets,  the  feat- 
ures would  wear  an  expression  of  intense  and 
hopeless  distress  ;  and  the  man  would  either  sink 
into  a  moping  idiot,  or  die  in  insane  despair. 

It  is  now  fully  understood  on  all  hands,  that 
the  lighter  and  more  casual  elements  of  our  food 


Recreation.  181 

are  in  their  way  quite  as  essential  as  the  solid 
staple  of  it.  If  the  one  makes  the  fibre  of  the 
frame,  the  other  makes  the  flesh — in  which  the 
fibre  imbeds  itself,  and  by  which  it  carries  on  the 
play  of  life — fair,  firm,  and  elastic.  All  force 
mnst  be  clothed  to  be  fruitful;  and  the  body, 
the  flesh  in  which  the  muscular  and  nervous  skel- 
eton, so  to  speak,  embosoms  itself,  is  supplied 
mainly  by  the  secondary  elements  of  this  food. 
They  yield  its  juices,  and  give  to  it  that  mobility 
and  play  of  power  which  make  it  a  meet  organ 
for  a  spirit's  use.  Let  the  body  be  robbed  of 
these,  and  it  becomes  a  mummy;  for  all  the 
higher  uses  of  a  body — dead. 

Transpose  this  into  the  moral  key,  and  you 
have  the  history  of  what  goes  by  the  name  of 
Puritanism.  It  is  an  effort,  a  very  noble  effort  if 
you  will,  to  live  on  too  solid  and  stimulating  food. 
For  the  moment,  like  a  severe  discipline  when  a 
man  is  in  training,  it  nerved  great  men  for  great 
achievements.  They  cut  themselves  off  from 
most  of ,  the  invigorating  and  recreative  juices 
which  flow  into  a  man  from  the  glad,  beautiful 
world  around  him,  and  up  from  the  lily  and  the 
daisy  beneath  his  feet.  "  One  thing  I  do^'^  was 
their  motto.     Stars,  lilies,  the  music  of  creation — 


182  The  Home  Life, 

these  are  all  distractions.  "  I  liaye  to  wield  ^  the 
sword  of  the  Lord  and  of  Gideon,'  in  a  battle  of 
life  or  death  against  the  devil  and  his  works ;  and 
what  time,  what  thought,  have  I  to  spare  for  dal- 
liance with  the  lighter  graces  and  ornaments  of 
life  ? "  There  are  some  graceful  words  of  Keble's, 
to  which  the  ascetic  spirit  gives  a  certain  tinge, 
which  might  present  very  fairly  the  image  of 
their  thought : — 

"  Sweet  is  the  smile  of  home ;  the  mutual  look 
"When  hearts  are  of  each  other  sure ; 
Sweet  all  the  jojs  that  crowd  the  household  nook, 
The  haunt  of  aU  affections  pure. 

"  Yet  in  the  world  even  these  abide,  and  we, 
Above  the  world  our  calling  boast : 
Once  gain  the-  mountain  top,  and  thou  art  free ; 
Till  then,  who  rest,  presume ;  who  turn  to  look,  are 
lost." 

One  can  fancy  the  spirit  of  these  words  nerving 
the  hand  of  a  stern  Parliamentarian  trooper,  as 
he  took  a  fresh  grip  of  his  sword-handle,  and 
turned  himself  once  more  to  the  field  where  he 
meant  to  conquer  or  die.  "  Cest  magnifique^  mais 
ce  n^ est  pas  la  guerre ^^"^  said  the  Frenchmen,  when 
they  saw  the  terrible  cavalry  charge  at  Balaclava. 
And  we  may  say  reverently  of  the  Puritan,  "  It 


Recreation.  183 

is  magnificent,  but  it  is  not  life."  Thej  lived 
only  upon  the  strong  meat  of  the  word  in  its 
most  concentrated  form.  It  made  them  splendid 
men  for  the  crisis — spare,  stern,  resolute,  with 
moral  muscles  tough  as  wire  ;  but  in  the  long  run 
Puritanism  grew  disjointed  and  dissolute;  men 
maddened  under  its  limitations  and  denials,  and 
at  length  broke  out  into  wild  excesses.  England 
had  to  pay  the  penalty  of  many  a  wanton  and 
godless  generation,  for  this  effort  to  live  only  upon 
the  solids  of  spiritual  life.* 

*  I  am  conscious  that  I  am  using  the  word  "  Puritan "  in  a 
vague  and  popular  way.  It  describes  something  to  the  popular 
apprehension  which  is  very  real,  and  which  was  characteristic  of  a 
great  party  which  has  left  its  mark  very  visibly  on  our  national 
character  and  history.  But  strictly  speaking,  narrowness  and  want 
of  geniality  can  by  no  means  be  fairly  charged  against  the  great 
Puritan  leaders  ;  nor,  until  it  had  become  fanatical  during  its  long 
and  tremendous  struggle,  against  the  party  which  they  led.  I 
doubt  if  the  world  has  ever  seen  such  a  rich  and  beautiful  home 
life,  as  might  be  found  in  many  a  Puritan  household  in  England 
during  the  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The  most  com- 
plete, cultivated,  and  courteous  gentlemen,  and  the  most  sweet, 
lofty,  and  gracious  women,  that  England  has  ever  nurtured,  were 
of  that  school.  Able  writers  of  our  day,  who  by  no  means  sym- 
pathise with  our  Nonconformist  ideas,  have  been  at  pains  to  prove 
that  we  owe  very  much  of  that  habit  of  thought  and  life  which  dis- 
tinguishes the  "  English  gentleman  "  (a  species  which  is  by  itself 
in  the  world)  to  Puritan  influence.  And,  certainly,  a  party  which 
had  Essex  for  its  soldier,  Selden  for  its  lawyer,  Yane  for  its  states- 
man, and  Milton  for  its  poet,  might  lift  up  its  head  among  the  most 
cultivated  and  accomplished  of  the  time.     Nor  was  even  Cromwell 


184  The  Home  Life. 

The  world,  too,  is  as  ricli  in  varieties  as  tlie 
provision  which  God  has  made  for  the  physical 
nourishment  of  man.  There  are  nooks  every- 
where around  us  where  nature  is  sporting,  and 
simply  enjoying  herself.  After  large  broad  tracts, 
on  which  she  has  been  working  on  a  grand  scale, 
and  for  high  ends,  you  constantly  discover  a  nook 
where  she  has  manifestly  had  no  end  but  beauty, 
and  no  care  beyond  the  present  joy.  Every  des- 
ert has  its  Ehms,  where  the  springs  gurgle  liquid 
music,  and  the  palms  fling  cool  shadow  over  the 
glowing  sand.  The  tired  pilgrim  cannot  choose 
but  ungird  himself,  and  fling  himself  lazily  on  the 
grass  by  the  murmuring  stream.     Nature  in  such 

without  a  rich  vein  of  geniality,  courtesy,  and  hearty  appreciation 
of  the  graces  and  beauties  of  life.  The  evidence  on  this  point  is 
abundant.  Take  this  little  conversation  with  Whitlocke  about  the 
Swedish  embassy,  in  proof: — "How  could  you  pass  over  their  long 
winter  nights  ?  "  the  Protector  asked  Whitlocke  at  the  audience 
of  return  from  his  embassy.  "  I  kept  my  people  together,"  was 
the  reply,  "  and  in  action  and  recreation,  by  having  music  in  my 
house,  and  encouraging  that  and  the  exercise  of  dancing,  which 
held  them  by  the  eyes  and  ears,  and  gave  them  diversion  without 
any  offence.  And  I  caused  the  gentlemen  to  have  disputations  in 
Latin,  and  declamations  upon  words  which  I  gave  them."  And 
the  dialogue  proceeded.  Cromwell — "  Those  were  very  good  diver- 
sions, and  made  your  house  a  little  academy."  Wliitlockc — "I 
thought  these  recreations  better  than  gaming  for  money,  or  going 
forth  to  places  of  debauchery."  Cromwell — *'  It  was  much  bet- 
ter." 


Recreation.  185 

nooks  is  lavish  of  beauties ;  slie  makes  a  festa  for 
lier  cliildren,  and  will  have  them  dance  and  sing. 
Dreary  monotonies,  weary  marches  along  life's 
dusty  levels,  never  fail  to  be  broken  at  blessed 
intervals  by  stations  where  the  very  genius  of  the 
spot  cries,  "  Eest  a  while  and  play."  There  are 
no  long  stretches  of  duty  without  green  pastures 
here  and  there  by  the  way,  in  which  the  jaded 
intellect  and  will  may  wander,  unbound  from  the 
yoke  a  while,  and  recreate  themselves  for  fresh 
toils. 

Yet  nature  is  not  all  dimpled  with  smiles. 
Stern  motherly  commandment  is  the  broad  ex- 
pression of  her  countenance.  "  In  the  sweat  of 
thy  trow  shalt  thou  eat  hread^''  is  the  sentence. 
God  meant  it,  and  nature  means  it,  and  is  minded 
that  you  and  I  shall  never  forget  it.  But  ever 
and  anon,  lest  men  faint  by  reason  of  the  way,  she 
bm'sts  forth  into  such  joyous  merriment,  that  none 
but  churls  can  escape  the  infection,  and  refuse  to 
dance  a  measure  with  her  before  they  pass  on. 
But  the  heir  of  the  old  ascetic  discipline  may  an- 
swer, "  Yes,  this  is  just  the  wantonness  of  nature. 
She  is  a  Circe,  and  in  these  Elims  and  Hesperian 
gardens  she  ensnares  and  befools  mankind.  The 
Lord  of  nature  has  warned  us  against  her  seduc- 


186  The  Rome  Life. 

tions.  Of  all  that  comes  to  us  so  pleasantly  and 
naturally  we  must  beware.  Our  life  is  to  be  one 
long,  stem  struggle  against  tbe  wooings  and  pres- 
sures of  nature.  We  are  to  live  here  after  a  high- 
er course  than*  the  course  of  this  sin-tainted  world 
which  is  around  us,  a  course  of  which  yon  star  is 
the  symbol ;  and 

"  Like  as  a  star 
That  makcth  not  haste, 
That  taketh  not  rest, 

Be  each  one  fulfilling 
His  God-given  'hest." 

Thus  the  plea  is  set  forth.  I  know  not  wheth- 
er it  was  to  rebuke  this  craven  dread  of  nature, 
and  of  natural  festivity,  that  Christ  did  His  first 
great  "  sign "  at  a  marriage  festival,  and  on  an 
element  specially  ministrant  to  the  joy  and  exhil- 
aration of  the  guests.  It  is  as  though  He  were 
resolved  that  their  festivity  should  be  hearty 
while  they  were  about  it;  the  best  wine  He 
brought  forth  to  crown  the  feast.  Was  it  to 
purge  them  of  the  fear  of  any  of  God's  creat- 
ures, or  of  God's  occasions  of  recreation ;  and  to 
fill  them  with  the  fear  lest  evil  passion  and  lust- 
ful licence  should  make  unseemly  the  presence  of 
the  Lord  ? 


Recreation,  187 

But  there  are  Christians  living  now,  you  may 
count  them  by  myriads,  who,  were  the  Lord  to 
reappear  and  to  repeat  this  miracle,  would  shout 
at  Him  as  they  did  of  old,  "  Behold  a  gluttonous 
man  and  a  winebibber,  a  friend  of  publicans  and 
sinners ! "  ITot  that  there  is  not  very  much  in 
the  facts  of  life  to  suggest  the  fear  of  which  I 
have  been  speaking,  if  fear  were  the  right  enter- 
tainment of  facts.  But  my  belief  is,  that  the 
fear  to  a  great  extent  makes  the  facts,  and  is  the 
real  parent  of  the  danger.  How  would  the  fear 
pass  out  of  all  gay  hours  and  festive  occasions,  if 
we  were  conscious  of  the  presence  of  Emmanuel 
in  our  midst !  The  danger  is  a  real  one,  but  we 
learn  no  immoderate  pleasures  from  Nature. 
Would  we  but  study  and  observe  her  order,  in- 
stead of  transgressing  it,  we  should  learn  wisdom 
and  temperance  in  her  school.  The  danger  is  not 
to  be  mastered  by  the  fear  of  ^Nature,  but  by  the 
only  fear  which  elevates  and  purifies — the  fear  of 
God. 

The  subject  to  which  I  am  about  to  call  your 
attention  is  recreation.  By  recreation  I  mean 
the  play  of  the  faculties,  without  any  object  be- 
yond the  immediate  pleasure  which  the  exercise 


188  The  Home  Life, 

of  them  yields.     And  let  me  insist  on  a  first 
principle. 

I.  Play  cannot  in  any  wise,  or  by  any  one,  be 
made  tbe  main  business  of  life. 

It  is  an  element,  an  ingredient  only,  and  it 
needs  wise  mixing.  It  is  essentially  a  question 
of  proportion,  as  it  is  with  food,  and  this  question 
of  proportion  is  almost  the  main  question  of  life. 
If  a  man  attempts  to  live  wholly  upon  the  solids, 
his  frame,  as  we  have  seen,  becomes  strained  to 
the  pitch  of  agony,  and  breaks  in  madness  or 
death.  K  a  man  lives  upon  the  slops,  his  frame 
passes  quickly  into  pulp  and  flabbiness ;  the  face 
becomes  bleared,  the  expression  vacant,  the  form 
gross,  and  the  whole  man  vague,  listless,  and  con- 
temptible. And  it  is  thus  also  with  the  moral 
man.  The  main  food  of  man's  higher  life  is  work, 
hard,  stern,  uncompromising  work.  At  least  so 
the  God  who  made  us  tells  us  in  His  book,  and 
He  presses  home  the  lessons  in  forms  from  which 
it  is  impossible  for  us  to  escape.  To  work  by  fits 
and  starts  in  the  intervals  of  pleasure,  to  make 
that  the  main  concern,  and  work  the  interlude,  is 
to  kill  all  pure  enjoyment  at  the  very  heart. 
Work  is  the  mother  of  rest,  strain  of  pleasure. 


Recreation,  189 

IsTo  man  knows  wliat  rest  is  but  the  weary ;  no 
man  can  enjoy  but  be  who  is  relaxing  a  strain. 
The  pleasm-es  of  idleness  are  like  the  smiles  of  an 
idiot,  tbe  very  dreariest  and  ghastliest  things  un- 
der the  sun.  The  men  whose  main  business  in 
life  is  to  kill  time,  are  killing  much  more  than 
time,  as  they  will  discover  in  eternity. 

Just  as  the  lighter  elements  of  food  mingle 
with  the  more  substantial  in  minor  proportion — 
just  as  the  nooks  of  violet-tinted  shade  spot  here 
and  there  the  broad  hot  fields  where  sinewy  hands 
are  reaping  the  corn — so  in  the  same  proportion 
must  recreation  temper  our  work.  The  idle  know 
nothing  of  recreation,  simply  because  they  have 
nothing  to  recreate.  He  who  dreams  by  the 
brook  on  a  mossy  bank  through  the  hot  summer's 
day,  plashing  its  cool  waters  on  his  languid  brow, 
and  falling  to  dream  again,  may  go  home  when 
he  has  done.  Like  Gideon's  "  ten  thousand  "  who 
knelt  by  the  stream,  he  will  not  be  wanted.  He 
who  drinks  of  the  brook  by  the  way  as  he  presses 
on,  and  he  only,  will  "  lift  up  the  head."  It  is 
the  true  idea  of  recreation,  a  sipping  of  the  brook 
by  the  way ;  its  fruit  cannot  be  better  described 
than  as  a  lifting  up  of  the  head. 


190  Tlie  Home  Life. 

II.  Taking  up,  then,  tlie  broad  idea  of  recrea- 
tion, without  attempting  for  the  present  a  critical 
examination  of  its  natm'e,  my  first  plea  on  its  be- 
half is  for  freedom. 

By  freedom  I  mean,  the  absence  of  artificial 
and  minatural  circumscribing  lines.  I  am  not 
unmindful  of  the  audience  which  I  am  addressing 
— for  I  preserve  the  form  of  spoken  discourse  ad- 
visedly in  these  pages — and  I  think  it  probable 
that  most  of  those  whom  these  words  may  reach 
will  have  been  bred  in  a  certain  school,  and  with 
certain  \dews  as  to  recreation,  derived  from  a 
noble  spiritual  ancestry,  and  the  traditions  of  a 
stormy  and  struggling  time.  We  Independents, 
who  are  the  chief  heirs  of  the  ancient  I^oncon- 
formist  traditions,  which  stretch  back  into  the 
early  Puritan  age  and  beyond,  should  speak  and 
think  with  deep  reverence  of  that  narrowness  of 
thought  and  sympathy,  as  we  call  it,  which  was 
characteristic  of  the  great  party  (when  it  had  set- 
tled into  a  party)  from  which  we  spring.  "We 
owe  it  mainly  to  that  Nonconformity  that  we 
have  a  world  at  all  in  which  we  can  decently 
dwell.  The  nature  of  the  world  against  which 
the  Puritans  witnessed,  and  from  which  they 
sternly  separated,  is  very  imperfectly  apprehended 


Becreation,  191 

by  most  of  us.  It  would  amuse,  if  it  did  not  sad 
den  us,  to  hear  simple-hearted  lads  and  girls  grow- 
ing up  amid  tlie  influences  of  a  pious  home,  talk- 
ing with  grave  face  of  separating  themselves  from 
the  world — ^that  is,  a  few  innocent  pursuits  and 
enjoyments — under  the  idea  that  they  are  imitat- 
ing the  stern  virtues  of  their  ancestors,  who  cut 
themselves  off  from  a  world  in  which  decent  men 
and  women  could  hardly  live  at  all.  It  would  be 
well  though,  if  we  took  our  traditions  from  the  el- 
ders instead  of  the  dregs  of  the  school.  The  dread 
of  amusement,  the  indifference  to  beauty,  the  de- 
termination somehow  or  other  to  make  a  disriaal 
thing  of  life,  which  characterised  the  lees  of  the 
party  embittered  by  a  long  struggle,  we  have 
taken  for  our  inheritance;  and  till  lately  we 
thought  it  our  duty  to  make  the  ashes  conspicuous 
upon  our  heads  as  we  passed  along  our  path. 
There  is  much  that  is  curious  connected  with  this 
indifference  to  beauty  in  literature,  architecture, 
and  art  generally,  which  has  nothing  specially  to 
do  with  Puritan  or  even  Eoundhead  times.  St. 
Bernard  might  be  supposed  to  be  at  the  opposite 
pole  to  the  Houndheads,  who  looked  malignantly 
at  the  beauty  of  our  cathedrals ;  or  to  our  imme- 
diate forefathers,  who  thought  to  honour  with  the 


192  The  Home  Life, 

sternest  simplicity,  or  the  barest  ugliness  of  form, 
the  spiritual  use  of  their  meeting-houses,  which, 
happily,  the  exigencies  of  the  time  compelled 
them  to  keep  carefully  out  of  sight.  But  Bernard 
might  have  been  a  Roundhead  preacher,  taking 
up  his  testimony  against  the  architectural  harlotry 
of  King's  College  Chapel  or  "Wells  Cathedral,  or 
even  a  stiff  Independent,  bearing  witness  against 
the  milder  beauties  of  such  Gothic  as  we  allow 
ourselves  in  these  days,  when  he  exclaims, 

"  O  vanity  of  vanities !  but  not  more  vain 
than  foolish.  The  Church's  walls  are  resplen- 
dent, but  the  poor  are  not  there The 

curious  find  wherewith  to  amuse  themselves — the 
wretched  find  no  stay  for  them  in  their  misery. 
Why,  at  least,  do  we  not  reverence  the  images  of 
the  saints,  with  which  the  very  pavement  we  walk 
on  is  covered.  Often  an  angel's  mouth  we  spit 
into,  and  the  face  of  some  saint  trodden  on  by  the 

passers-by But  if  we  cannot  do  without 

the  images,  why  can  we  not  spare  the  brilliant 
colours  ?  What  has  all  this  to  do  with  monks, 
with  professors  of  poverty,  with  men  of  spiritual 
minds  ?  Again,  in  the  cloisters,  what  is  the  mean- 
ing of  those  ridiculous  monsters,  of  that  deformed 
beauty,  that  beautiful  deformity,  before  the  very 


I 


Recreation,  193 

eyes  of  the ' brethren  wlien  reading?  What  are 
disgusting  monkeys  there  for,  or  ferocious  lions, 
or  horrible  centaurs,  or  spotted  tigers,  or  fighting 
soldiers,  or  huntsmen  sounding  the  bugle  %  You 
may  see  there  one  head  with  many  bodies,  or  one 
body  with  numerous  heads.  Here  is  a  quadruped 
with  a  serpent's  tail ;  there  is  a  fish  with  a  beast's 
head ;  there  is  a  creature,  in  front  of  a  horse,  be- 
hind a  goat ;  another  has  horns  at  one  end,  and  a 
horse's  tail  at  the  other.  In  factj  such  an  endless 
variety  of  forms  appear  everywhere,  that  it  Js 
more  pleasant  to  read  in  the  stonework  than  in 
books,  and  to  spend  the  day  in  admiring  these 
oddities,  than  in  meditating  on  the  law  of  God. 
Good  God !  if  we  are  not  ashamed  of  these  ab- 
surdities, why  do  not  we  grieve  at  the  cost  of 
them  ? — Moeison's  St.  Bernard^  p.  148. 

Mr.  Morison  quotes  in  a  note  an  amusing  but 
very  suggestive  passage  from  Mr.  Carlyle's  Latter- 
day  Pamphlets,  which  is  not  without  its  bearings 
on  the  matter  in  hand.  ^ 

"  '  May  the  devil  fiy  away  with  the  fine  arts,' 
exclaimed  confidentially  once  in  my  hearing,  one 
of  our  most  distinguished  public  men ;  a  senti- 
ment that  often  recurs  to  me.  I  perceive  too  well 
how  true  it  is  in  our  case.  A  public  man,  intent 
9 


194  The  Home  Life. 

on  any  real  business,  does,  I  suppose,  -find  tlie  fine 

arts  rather  imaginary, feels  them  to  be  a 

pretentious  nothingness;  a  confused  superfluity 
and  nuisance,  purchased  with  cost ;  wh^t  he,  in 
brief  language,  denominates  a  bore." 

But  I  am  wandering  from  my  theme.  Art  is 
not  in  question  here,  but  recreation.  Art,  ^s 
recreatWe,  is  a  matter  on  which  I  may  have  a 
word  to  say  by  and  by.  I  plead  for  freedom  of 
recreation — the  absence  of  artificial  and  unnatural 
limitations.  And  I  write  specially  for  those 
whose  lot  in  life  subjects  them  to  these  limita- 
tions, and  for  the  parents  who  impose  them,  and 
who  hold  to  what  they  mistake  for  the  old  tradi- 
tions in  these  matters,  together  with  much  that  is 
very  noble  and  very  beautiful  in  their  homes. 
And  for  these  Christian  homes,  for  their  simpli- 
city and  health,  for  the  manliness  and  the  woman- 
liness of  the  youths  and  maidens  who  are  to  go 
forth  from  them,  I  am  persuaded  that  a  chief  ne- 
cessity is  freedom.  I  believe  that  the  time  is 
come  when  those  who  are  looked  to  for  teaching 
must  speak  out  about  this,  wisely  and  temper- 
ately on  the  one  hand,  but  clearly  and  firmly  on 
the  other. 

The  fundamental  idea  of  the   discipline   of 


Meoreation.  195 

such  Christian  homes  seems  to  be,  that  "  profess- 
ing "  Christians  must  draw  a  formal  line  between 
their  pursuits  and  pleasures,  and  the  pursuits  and 
pleasures  of  what  is  called  the  world,  or  their 
"  profession  "  will  become  "  vox  et  prcBtera  niMV 
I  hold  this  idea  to  be  a  radically  false  one. 
Christ  did  nothing  of  the  kind,  and  He  taught 
His  disciples  to  do  nothing  of  the  kind.  He 
went,  and  His  disciples  went,  freely  about  the 
world,  not  drawing  a  Hne,  but  living  a  life  which 
condemned  the  evil  which  was  in  the  world,  and 
justified  the  good.  We  have  taken  to  lines  and 
forgotten  lives.  It  is  time  that  we  began  anew. 
We  are  living  upon  the  negations  and  abstinences 
of  our  fathers.  Lines  drew  themsel/ues  in  the  days 
when  the  host  at  every  great  dinner  party  who 
did  not  do  his  best  to  intoxicate  his  guests,  was 
held,  to  be  churlish ;  when  the  theatre  was  the 
open  and  shameless  haunt  of  the  most  bedizened 
prostitutes  in  the  town,  and  when  the  man  who 
touched  a  card  or  a  cue  was  in  a  fair  way  to  be 
tempted  to  gamble  away  his  fortune.  Lines  drew 
themselves  in  those  days  for  every  pure-hearted 
self-respectful  Christian;  and  it  is  just  because 
our  fathers  had  the  firmness  to  keep  within  the 
lines  which  drew  themselves  so  clearly,  and  to 


196  The  Home  Life. 

protest  by  their  lives  against  the  doings  without 
them,  that  we  live  in  days  in  which  tlie  lines  have 
happily  become  dim.  This  tradition  of  limits 
survives,  but  we  are  puzzled  to  know  where  to 
place  them ;  and  so  we  defend  the  old  ones  with 
what  appearance  of  earnestness  we  may.  "  Men, 
after  all,  are  pretty  much  like  sheep,"  as  Eichter 
says ;  "  if  you  meet  a  flock  of  sheep  coming  along 
a  lane,  and  put  your  stick  against  the  wall,  the 
first  sheep  will  jump  over  it,  but  if  you  take  your 
stick  away,  all  the  others  will  jump  too." 

I  am  persuaded  that  the  mental  and  moral 
health  of  our  children  is  grievously  impaired  by 
the  miserably  unreal  distinctions  which  we  draw 
between  things  which  may  be  allowed  and  things 
which  may  not.  "  The  line  must  be  drawn  some- 
where," seems  to  be  our  fundamental  thesis.  And 
so  we  occupy  om'selves  with  barriers,  instead  of 
nourishing  an  intelligent  and  manly  habit  of  dis- 
cernment in  ourselves  and  in  our  children,  and 
leaving  the  lines  as  we  go  about  the  world  to  be 
determined  by  the  shadow  which  is  cast  by  our 
lives.  Take  a  homely  specimen.  At  a  time 
when  French  wines  were  not  so  common  and 
cheap  as  happily  they  are  now,  a  good  deacon  of 
one  of  our  churches  was  sadly  scandalised  at  see- 


Recreation.  197 

ing  some  of  the  costly  and  luxurious  beverage  at 
the  table  of  a  brother  deacon  with  whom  he  was 
dining.  On  being  pressed  for  the  reason  of  his 
discomfortable  aspect,  he  could  only  plead,  "  Well, 
you  know,  you  must  draw  the  line  somewhere — I 
draw  mine  at  port." 

It  sounds  absurd ;  but  those  who  laugh  are 
doing  precisely  the  same  things  in  principle  every 
day.  There  are  certain  amusements,  which  those 
whom  we  choose  to  call  people  of  the  world  in- 
dulge in — a  ganie  of  cards,  a  game  of  billiards,  a 
play  now  and  then,  or  what  you  will — which  our 
stricter  habit,  learnt,  as  I  have  said,  from  a  good- 
ly ancestry,  places  under  a  ban.  But  the  wonder- 
ful part  of  the  matter  is  here.  You  will  find  in 
Christian  homes,  and  in  the  habits  of  Christian 
society,  not  exactly  the  same  things,  but  imita- 
tions of  them  on  a  small  scale,  which  come  as 
near  to  them  as  possible.  There  are  very  few  of 
the  world's  honest  amusements — and  by  honest  I 
mean  such  as  are  not  vicious  in  their  essence  or 
in  their  palpable  associations — which  are  not  is- 
sued in  smaller  type  for  the  amusement  of  "  pro- 
fessing Christians"  and  their  children.  We  get 
as  near  to  the  line  as  possible,  and  press  against 
it — but  "  we  must  di'aw  the  line  somewhere  "  still. 


I 


198  The  Borne  Life, 

There  are  entertainments  in  London — excel- 
lent, I  dare  say — to  which  Christian  people  throng 
with  their  childi-en,  which  lack  nothing  of  the 
theatre  but  the  genius  and  the  name.     There  are 
pious  little  books  issued  by  the  myriad — I  wish  I 
could  call  them  excellent  too,  but  the  major  part 
of  such  -as  I  have  come  across  seem  to  me  the 
sickliest  trash,  with  as  much  taste  as  the  white  of 
an  ^g^ — which  are  meant  to  supply  the  craving 
of  hungry  young  souls  for  honest  fairy  tales  and 
the  like,  to  their  utter  damage  and  loss.     Fairy 
tales  are  a  charming  condiment  in  the  intellectual 
food  of  children;   they  help  to   keep  alive  the 
sense  of  the  infinite  beauty  and  wonderfulness  of 
the  world,  which  "  good  little  books,"  even  when 
they  are  didactically  trying  to  describe  it,  drearily 
deny.     And,  turn  where  you  will,  you  find  Chris- 
tian recreation  provided  after  the  pattern  of  world- 
ly recreation,  with  some  slight  moral  infusions  in 
it,  or  some  puling  application,  which  is  supposed 
to  keep  it  within  the  line.     How  strangely  careless 
God  must  have  been,  all  these  ages,  of  the  moral 
and  intellectual  culture  of  "  these  little  ones,"  if 
our  modern  method  is  the  right  one :  for  nothing 
wearing  its  likeness  is  to  be  found  in  His  works 
or  in  His  word !     There  are  tales  enough  in  His 


Recreation.  199 

book  with  the  moral  in  them,  not  after  them ;  and 
no  visions  of  fairy-land  which  the  most  cunning 
playwright  has  conjured  out  of  his  teeming  brain, 
can  mate  that  world  of  wonder  and  splendour 
which  He  has  unveiled  to  us  in  His  Apocalypse. 

But,  be  that  as  it  may,  it  appears  to  me  to  be 
most  detrimental  to  the  moral  nurture  of  your 
children,  that  they  should  be  allowed  to  think  , 
that  you  press  as  near  to  the  line  as  you  dare, 
and  that  there  is  a  hankering,  though  restrained 
by  principle,  for  that  which  lies  beyond.  They 
are  more  likely  to  catch  the  infection  of  the 
hankering  than  of  the  restraint.  And  it  gener- 
ally happens  that  the  form  of  amusement  which 
is  allowed  in  "strict  families,"  while  following 
"the  world"  up  to  a  certain  point,  stops  short 
where  the  real  power  of  recreation — ^that  is,  the 
pbwer  of  giving  a  joyful  play  to  the  faculties — 
begins.  It  is  recreation  and  water,  and  that  so 
weak,  that  all  stimulating,  re-invigorating  power 
is  lost.  In  fact,  looking  around  on  those  poor 
imitations  of  the  recreations  of  the  world  which 
we  allow  ourselves  and  our  children  to  enjoy, 
I  am  driven  to  the  conclusion,  that  we  have  not 
made  our  proscription  of  the  great  recreative  in- 
fluences, towards  which  man's  nature  has  yearned 


200  The  Rome  Life. 

in  all  ages — the  drama  and  the  dance,  for  instance 
— anything  like  a  success.  TVe  simply  drop  down 
into  feeble  and  timid  forms  of  them,  and  do  with 
a  half  heart  and  a  restless  conscience,  what  must 
be  done  with  a  whole  heart  and  a  good  conscience, 
if  it  is  to  have  any  virtue  in  it  at  all. 

The  reasons  of  moderation,  the  persuasives  to 
Belf-control,  are  one  thing ;  they  have  to  do  with 
what  is  noblest  in  us.  The  "  touch  not,  taste  not, 
handle  not "  method  is  another  thing,  and  has  to 
do  with  what  is  selfish,  narrow,  and  base.  Unless 
there  be  broad  reasons,  such  as  the  eye  of  a 
healthy  moral  sense  gathers  at  once,  for  the  com- 
mandment, the  proscription  of  this  or  that  place, 
exercise,  or  pursuit,  robs  your  children  of  the  no- 
blest moral  discipline  of  their  youth — the  exer- 
cise of  temperance  and  self-control.  It  is  an 
easier  method  than  the  divine,  this  method  of 
"forbidding."  It  is  easily  taught,  easily  learnt, 
and  it  yields  for  the  moment  a  wonderful  appear- 
ance of  success.  But  the  restraint  that  is  learnt 
in  freedom  is  the  only  restraint  that  has  any  liv- 
ing fojrce  in  it.  It  is  a  longer  and  a  harder  mat- 
ter to  learn  it;  but  it  forms  a  fortress  whose 
strength  is  something  nobler  than  the  absence  of 


Recreation.  201 

an  assailant ;  it  hoids  itg^own  against  all  comers, 
and  remains  impregnable  through  eternity. 

We  are  widening  onr  views  about  all  other 
matters.  Ten  years  ago  it  was  thought  heresy  to 
utter  truths,  which  now  we  hear  gladly  that  every 
one  believes.  We  have  larger,  freer  thoughts 
about  our  divine  relations,  about  the  Bible,  about 
life's  meaning  and  duties,  and  it  is  time  that  we 
enlarged  our  thoughts  about  our  recreations.  It 
is  time  that  we  ceased  our  proscriptions  of  what 
nature  yearns  for,  and  the  effort  to  hedge  about 
young  steps  with  unnatural  and  artificial  lines. 
Let  us  throw  our  whole  strength  into  the  cultiva- 
tion of  that  noble  moderation  and  self-restraint 
which  was  the  true  glory  and  dignity  of  Puritan 
homes.  That  is  the  grand  safeguard.  That 
•fortress  is  safe  whose  firm  defenders  are  ever 
within.  It  is  the  noblest  and  most  precious  fruit 
of  education — of  difficult  culture  if  of  high  vir- 
tue ;  but  no  Christian  parent  may  dare  to  shrink 
from  the  task.  Men  shrink  from  freedom  as  the 
mother  of  licence.  Christ  had  no  dread  of  it 
when  He  sent  "  the  perfect  law  of  libert^"^  into 
the  world.  The  real  mother  of  licence  is  restric- 
tion and  exclusion.  IlTone  plunge  so  madly  into 
pleasures,  as  those  who  have  been  fretted  through 
9* 


202  Tlie  Home  Life. 

youth  by  unnatural  restraints. '  You  do  not  keep 
your  children  out  of  the  natural  and  honest  pleas- 
ures of  young  life  by  your  lines  and  hedges,  you 
simply  send  them  into  them  with  an  untrained 
will  and  a  trembling  conscience.  They  have  no 
belief  that  the  Lord  can  be  there.  Of  that  be- 
lief you  liave  robbed  them ;  and,  robbed  of  that 
belief,  the  devil  makes  sport  and  spoil  of  them  at 
his  will. 

III.  I  now  pass  on  to  consider  the  essential 
idea  of  recreation,  which  I  have  defined  already 
as  the  free  play  and  exercise  of  the  powers,  for 
the  pure  sake  of  the  pleasure  which  it  affords. 

The  end  is  to  recreate,  to  make  anew — as  nature 
comes  forth  each  day  from  her  bath  of  dews,  and 
man  from  his  bath  of  rest.  Nature  is  recreated 
each  morning.  Each  sunrise,  in  glittering  beau- 
ty, as,  on  the  first  morning  of  creation,  she  sings, 
with  pure,  fresh,  virgin  voice,  her  matin  song  to 
God.  There  is  song  in  the  morning  wind  among 
the  boughs ;  there  is  music  as  the  mountain  mists 
draw^ff  their  embattled  squadrons,  and  leave 
the  jocund  day  the  master  of  the  field.  The  floods 
of  splendour  w^hich  stream  upon  the  air  are  vocal 
with  praises,  which  yon  lark,  bathed  in  the  golden 


Recreation.  203 

glorj,  is  rehearsing  at  the  gate  of  heaven.  ISTa- 
ture  "  shouts  for  joy "  at  morning  prime,  ''  she 
also  sings."  And  the  end  of  recreation  is  to  make 
us  sing  instead  of  moaning  at  om-  tasks.  It  is  to 
restore  the  tension  of  the  spring  of  power,  and  to 
make  work  an  exhilarating  exercise  instead  of  a 
heart-breaking  toil.  Life  is  a  race,  a  battle,  a 
stretching  on  to  an  end.  The  tension  is  too  keen 
for  pleasure — the  Eden-life  is  over.  If  the  strain 
is  never  relaxed  it  becomes  sharp  agony,  and  fills 
the  air  with  moans.  So  God  bids  us  unbind  the 
yoke  aw^hile  and  play. 

Rest  is  not  recreation.  If  a  man  is  so  worn 
out  by  toil  that,  like  a  tired-out  horse,  he  just 
drops  when  he  is  unyoked,  and  lies  slumbering 
until  he  is  yoked  again,  he  is  not  recreating.  ^"0 
new  joy  will  come  to  such  a  man  in  his  work ; 
mere  rest  never  made  any  man  dance  and  sing. 
The  only  recreation  is  in  the  free  and  joyous  play 
of  the  powers,  for  the  sake  of  the  pure  pleasure 
which  the  exercise  yields.  A  bright  walk  in  the 
summer  evening  through  the  meadows  in  the  sun- 
set glow,  a  bath  in  the  dewy  evening  K^  filled 
with  a  golden  glory,  while  the  hum  of  life  settles 
down  to  its  repose — ^here  is  something  which  be- 
longs to  us,  and  which  God  enables  us  by  a  thou- 


204  The  Home  Life. 

sand  senses  to  take  in.  Every  sense  is  athrill  with 
delight  as  it  exercises  itself  on  the  objects  with 
which  God  has  surrounded  it  in  creation,  and  has 
drunk  in  a  full  draught  of  joy  from  an  unfaihng 
spring.  The  recreation  has  renewed  us;  we  go 
back  w^ith  new  and  joyful  energy  to  our  tasks. 
And  he  who,  when  his  work  is  done,  has  entered 
into  the  keen  rivalry  of  athletic  games  and  sports, 
and  has  strained  his  muscles  for  no  compulsion 
but  his  "  own  sweet  will "  to  strain  them,  goes 
home  weary  in  limb,  but  refreshed  and  recreated 
in  spirit,  and  something  of  the  joy  of  his  game 
abides  with  him  and  sings  through  his  work. 
Another  turns  from  the  weary  day-book  and 
ledger  to  read  with  instructed  eye  a  page  out  of 
the  great  Book  of  the  Creation ;  he  spends  his 
evening  in  his  laboratory  watching  the  play  of 
the  electric  fire,  or  the  rudiments  of  things  taking 
their  crystal  forms  under  his  hand,  and  pores  over 
it,  all  out  of  pure  love,  with  an  ever-fresh  wonder 
and  delight.  The  morning  will  call  him  forth 
with  new  energy  to  his  business  occupations,  he 
will  gipforth  from  his  home  a  new-made  man  to 
his  daily  tasks.  Another  finds  his  delight  in  the 
keen  play  of  intellect,  the  quick  flashing  glances 
of  sympathy,  in  music  and  the  music  of  motion, 


Recreation,  205 

and  all  the  relaxations  and  recreations  of  home- 
life  and  society. 

Happiest,  perhaps,  are  those  whose  taste  and 
culture  enable  them  to  find  a  rich  recreation  in 
the  pursuits  and  enjoyments  of  art.  The  habit 
of  studying  the  Divine  handiwork,  to  discover  its 
order  and  method,  that  we  may  think  over  again 
the  great  thoughts  of  God,  and  cultivate  our  pow- 
ers to  express  them  by  means  which  our  own  na- 
tm^e  supplies,  affords  the  highest  and  purest  rec- 
reation which  is  possible  for  man.  It  unveils 
to  us  the  mystery  of  the  creation,  and  gives  to 
us  the  loftiest  fellowship  with  our  friends.  Those 
able  to  practise  little,  may  at  any  rate  train  them- 
selves to  judge  and  enjoy.  The  pleasure  thus 
yielded  will  be  the  more  purely  recreative,  in  that 
it  is  so  far  removed  from  the  scenes  and  influences 
of  the  daily  toils.  Music,  the  fine  arts,  and  the 
higher  forms  of  literature,  call  unused  faculties 
into  play,  and  increase  immensely  both  the  capa- 
city of  the  nature  and  the  interest  and  enjoyment 
of  life.  Higher  uses  of  the  powers  thus  cultivated 
v/e  shall  discover,  when  the  things  "  whifeh  eye 
hath  not  seen,  which  ear  hath  not  heard,  and 
which  it  hath  not  entered  into  the  heart  of  man 
to  conceive,"  shall  appear.     The  essence  of  the 


206  The  Home  Life, 

recreation  in  all  cases  is  the  joy  which  is  found  in 
the  exercise  of  the  powers,  under  no  constraint 
but  that  of  the  pleasure  which  the  exercise  yields. 
It  is  a  draught  by  the  way  from  the  pure  foun- 
tain of  life's  pleasure,  which  sin  sealed  up  in 
Eden,  and  which  Christ  will  unseal  for  ever  in 
Heaven.  It  comes,  or  it  ought  to  come,  if  we 
but  knew  what  recreation  meant,  to  throw  some 
cheer  into  our  daily  tasks,  and  to  remind  us  of  a 
sphere  for  which  those  daily  tasks  are  training  us, 
where  the  free  play  of  our  powers  will  be  a  peren- 
nial bliss.  It  should  give  us  a  snatch  of  song  to 
lighten  our  labours ;  a  breath  of  cool  fresh  air  to 
play  through  the  heated  work-room  of  life.  Noth- 
ing is  recreation  which  does  not  tend  to  renew  the 
spring,  whatever  else  it  may  be.  Recreation  is 
emphatically  a  taste  of  the  lost  joy  which  was 
once  man's  heritage  in  Eden ;  the  hard  stern  toil 
of  life,  under  the  sentence,  "  In  the  sweat  of  thy 
brow  shalt  thou  eat  bread,"  is  the  condition  of  our 
regaining  it,  if  we  are  found  faithful,  in  heaven. 
By  this,  test  your  recreations.  All  else,  instead 
of  recreating,  dissipates  the  powers. 

But  why  limit  such  recreation  ?  It  is  noble 
and  beautiful,  and  why  should  it  not  occuj)y  all 
our  time  and  power  %     Surely  it  would  roU  back 


I 


Recreation.  207 

the  curse  from  us.  Why  should  we  "  fardels  bear, 
and  grunt  and  sweat  under  a  weary  life,"  when 
recreation  such  as  would  give  joyful  play  to  all 
our  faculties  lies  so  near  to  our  hand?  Let  us 
work  while  we  must,  and  recreate  just  as  much 
and  as  often  as  we  can.  Alas !  the  cm-se  is  within, 
as  well  as  on  our  lot ;  if  that  may  be  called  a 
curse  which  brings  such  boundless  blessing  in  its 
train.  The  law  of  labour  is  in  us^  as  well  as  on 
our  world.  There  is  no  escape  from  the  necessity 
but  by  missing  a  benediction.  The  daily  bread 
of  our  life  is  labour.  The  body  can  as  well  live 
without  bread  as  the  mind  and  spirit  without 
work.  The  sentence  of  toil  is  not  rolled  back 
from  us,  nor  will  it  be  rolled  back  until  our  pow- 
ers are  so  developed,  that  their  easy  joyous  play 
will  be  more  productive  than  now  our  most 
consuming  toil.  The  mere  play  of  a  man  of 
Turner's  power  is  worth  more,  and  will  "produce 
more,  than  the  most  elaborate  efforts  of  a  genius 
of  meaner  strain.  And  his  power  grew  by  such 
labour  as  few  men  in  his  generation,  busy  as  it 
was,  could  mate. 

Heaven  is  educating  us  all  for  a  great  future ; 
and  the  full  strain  of  work  is  the  condition  of  our 
recreating  to  some  high  purpose  in  time.     Cer- 


208  The  Home  Life. 

tain  it  is  that  recreation  degenerates  swiftly  into 
dissipation,  unless  it  comes  as  tlie  interlude  to 
long,  liard  spells  of  work.  Man  cannot  make 
recreation  his  business,,  without  poisoning  its  very 
springs,  and  becoming  that  saddest  of  all  objects 
to  look  upon,  a  man  with  no  business  in  the 
world.  Our  business  here  is  to  work,  to  work 
with  unflagging  energy.  Recreation  is  to  be  the 
handmaid  of  toil  here,  and  to  supersede  toil  in 
eternity. 

I  must  say  a  word  in  concluding  these  remarks, 
on  the  perils  of  recreation,  the  directions  in  which 
it  runs  very  easily  into  excess. 

The  worst — though,  from  another  point  of 
view,  we  might  call  it  the  best — of  Englishmen 
is,  the  intense  energy  which  they  throw  into  all 
their  pursuits.  Wherever  you  find  them  in  ear- 
nest, thay  throw  off  all  moderation,  and  manifest 
a  fierce  energy  which  is  wonderful  and  sometimes 
terrible  to  behold.  But  my  business  is  with  rec- 
reation now.  Foreigners  tliink  that  we  do  not 
understand  it,  we  seem  so  intensely  in  earnest 
about  it ;  and  some  Englishmen,  who  have  their 
eyes  open,  are  beginning  to  fear  that  much  of  the 
geniality  and  joy  of  life  is  being  killed  by  the 


Becreation.  209 

new  habits  of  tlie  times.  One  does  not  meet  with 
so  miicli  of  tlie  racy  humour  which  used  to  be  so 
characteristic  of  us ;  and  all  the  qualities  which 
jlourish  best  in  quiet  nooks  of  life  are  becoming 
year  by  year  more  rare.  And  I  sometimes  fear 
that  our  great  national  games  are  going  the  same 
way  to  death.  Our  physical  recreations,  which 
are  the  simplest  and  most  invigorating,  are  fast 
losing  their  recreative  power.  "We  are  spending 
on  our  play  an  amount  of  energy  and  endurance 
which  we  can  afford  only  for  our  tasks.  Athletic 
sports  have  passed  under  the  sway  of  competition, 
and  our  most  splendid  young  athletes  will  carry 
crippled  and  exhausted  bodies  into  the  arena  of 
life  as  the  result.  Even  cricket,  our  grand  old 
English  game,  has  become  a  battle,  and  just  in 
that  measure  it  has  ceased  to  be  a  play.  When 
men  have  to  pad  themselves  in  the  most  uncouth 
and  awkward  guise  before  they  handle  the  bat, 
and  stand  up  to  their  wickets  at  the  peril  of  a 
blow  which  may  easily  cripple  them  for  life,  the 
sport  passes  out  of  the  game.  It  becomes  a  bat- 
tle— a  fine  one,  if  you  will — which  you  may  watch 
with  the  keenest  interest ;  but  it  is  really  a  busi- 
ness, and  it  passes  into  the  hands  of  the  men  who 
can  make  it  the  study  of  their  lives.     There  may 


210  The  Home  Life. 

be  the  highest  sldll,  but  there  is  little  fun,  in  play- 
ing a  ball  flung  with  the  force  of  a  catapult,  with 
a  fair  prospect  of  a  broken  ankle-bone  if  you  miss 
it.  The  excitement  is  too  high  and  grave  for 
pleasure,  and  the  refreshment  of  a  game  of  cricket 
is  becoming  a  thing  of  the  past. 

Athletic  sports  at  our  universities  and  in  our 
rifle  regiments  develc^e  a  marvellous  pluck  and 
power  in  our  young  gymnasts,  but  they  take  alto- 
gether too  much  out  of  them  just  when  their 
frames  are  setting ;  and  when  we  want  them  for 
the  nobler  and  more  serious  work  of  life,  how 
many  of  them  will  be  mere  wrecks !  One  wishes 
that  a  list  could  be  drawn  up  of  the  number  of 
fine  lads  who  are  disabled  for  life  by  rowing,  run- 
ning, and  jumping  matches,  every  year,  simply 
through  having  been  put  under  a  too  prolonged 
and  oppressive  strain.  I  believe  that  the  Ox- 
ford and  Cambridge  middle-class  examinations  are 
working  much  mischief  in  the  same  direction. 
There  can  be  no  question  that  they  have  given  a 
very  strong  stimulus  to  education,  mainly  through 
acting  on  the  educators.  But  the  young  lads  who 
are  subjected  to  all  the  strain  and  excitement  of  a 
public  competition,  just  when  they  want  all  their 
nervous  force  to  develope  their  constitution,  have 


Reoreation.     *  211 

many  of  them  ta  pay  a  heavy  compensation  when 
they  go  forth  into  life.  We  have  just  strung  the 
instrument  up  to  its  fullest  tension  in  every  string. 
It  is  all  eager,  intense,  and  exhaustive  toil ;  and 
we  shall  have  the  strings  cracking,  and  the  whole 
tone  of  our  constitution  as  a  people  lowered. 

And  to  pass  for  a  moment  to  another  sphere 
of  recreation.  Do  you  think  that  the  Psalmists 
eould  have  written  about  dancing  as  they  did,  if 
they  had  been  shut  up  till  four  o'clock  in  the 
morning  in  the  miseries  of  a  modern  ball-room, 
choked  by  the  gas-poisoned  atmosphere,  and  with 
their  clothes  almost  torn  off  their  backs  in  the 
supper-room  crush  ?  What  we  want  imperatively 
is,  not  new  abstinences,  but  new  moderations— 
the  resolution  running  through  society  that  rec- 
reation shall  be  recreative,  and  shall  send  men 
and  women  back,  not  expended,  but  invigorated 
and  gladdened,  to  their  work.  We  do  our  very 
best  to  turn  our  recreations  into  dissipations,  by 
length  of  time  and  elaborate  accessories.  Con- 
certs, theatres,  dances,  sports,  all  suffer  miserably 
from  the  same  disease — excess.  All  true  recrea- 
tion will  be  brief,  simple,  and  ready  to  hand. 

I  have  spoken  of  dissipation;  it, is  the  precise 
opposite  of  recreation — the  one  gathers  and  stores, 


212  'The  Home  Life. 

tlie  other  scatters  and  squander^  power.  Mucli 
dissipation,  is  simply  recreation  in  excess — tlie  rec- 
reation of  men  wlio  are  too  hard-worked,  or  too 
ill-trained,  to  enjoy  any  but  the  most  fiery  stimu- 
lant by  way  of  change.  Over-long  hours,  over- 
hard  strain,  di'ive  men  to  dissipation,  instead  of 
recreation,  for  the  alternative  which  they  need. 
Foul  homes,  hot  work-shops,  and  bad  food,  are  the 
great  nurses  of  dram-drinking.  Our  social  sys- 
tem and  social  state  are  answerable  for  a  fearful 
amount  of  that  drunkenness  which  is  our  national 
curse  and  shame.  Dissipation  in  any  form  is  the 
great  drain  of  life.  Life  is  the  most  precious 
thing  which  God  has  given  or  can  give  us.  "What 
shall  a  man  give  in  exchange  for  his  life  ?  You 
have  only  a  certain  amount  in  you  of  life.  You 
may  spend  it  quickly  or  slowly.  You  may  ex- 
pend or  husband  it ;  but  when  it  is  gone,  there  is 
an  end.  iN'o  agony  of  effort  or  prayer  can  bring 
you  a  new  store. 

"  A  short  life  and  a  merry  one  "  is  the  cry  of 
dissipation.  "  A  noble  life  and  an  eternal  one  " 
is  the  creed  of  the  man  who  has  learned  the  secret 
of  life  from  God.*  "  A  short  life  and  a  merry 
one  !  "  Merry !  I  wish  you  could  come  in  upon 
your  merry  life  for  a  moment,  fresh   and.  pure 


Recreation.  213 

from  some  higher  region,  and  see  its  ghastly  guise. 
Merry !  May  I  be  out  of  the  hearing  of  your 
merriment,  when  you  come  forth  sick,  pallid, 
blear-eyed,  and,  as  you  say,  "  shaky,"  from  your 
night's  debauch;  and  may  God  keep  me  from 
hearing  you  moan  when  the  brief  debauch  of  life 
is  over,  and  you  sink  down,  a  fetid,  wailing  mass 
of  corruption,  into  the  pit  which  burns  all  the 
waste  of  the  universe  for  ever. 

Recreate  with  Clmst  in  presence.  He  is  as 
glad  with  us  at  our  marriage  festivals,  yea,  even 
at  our  sports  and  pastimes,  as  He  is  sad  with  us 
by  our  dear  ones'  graves.  Learn  from  BSm  the 
secret  of  moderation,  of  wise  temperance,  of 
strong  self-control.  Seek  strength  from  Him  to 
make  covenants  with  yourself,  and  keep  them ;  it 
lies  at  the  root  of  all  noble  living,  and  it  is  learned 
only  in  the  free  school  of  God. 


YIII. 
GETTIISTG    OUT   INTO   LIFE. 

"  And  Isaac  sent  away  Jacob.'''' — Gen.  xxviii.  5. 

Bitter  sweet  is  tlie  cup  of  life.  Sweetness  as 
of  paradise,  bitterness  as  of  death.  Intenser  joy 
than  is  known  to  mortals  no  creature  knoweth, 
but  alternate  with  intenser  pain.  I  heard  two 
poor  men  the  other  day,  in  a  railway  carriage, 
narrating  to  each  other  their  experiences ;  they 
seemed  to  have  had  a  long,  stem  struggle.  "  It 
is  a  hard  life,"  said  one ;  "  I  reckon  we  earn  our 
bite  and  sup  at  any  rate."  "Yes,"  I  thought, 
"  we  do ;  and  some  of  us,  if  we  cannot  earn,  try 
hard  to  win  something  more,  the  bread  of  the 
love  and  sympathy  of  God." 

For  those  who  are  finely  strung,  and  whose 
inner  chords  vibrate  keenly  to  the  lightest  touch, 
it  is  stem  work  to  live.  .IIow  many  men  and 
women  are  there  living  upon  earth  at  this  mo- 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  216 

ment  wlio,  were  the  simple  question,  "  To  be  or 
not  to  be  ?  "  set  before  tliem  with  no  dread  shapes 
there  in  the  shadows,  would  lie  down  full  joyfully 
to  rest  in  the  cold  bed  of  death  ?  Parents  know 
the  sweetness  and  bitterness  in  the  fullest  measure. 
^No  cry  so  glad  has  ever  been  heard  on  earth  as 
that  first  outburst  of  a  mother's  joy  and  triumph, 
"  /  have  gotten  a  man^  the  Lo7'd  I  "  no  moan  but 
one,  so  bitter,  so  desolate,  has  ever  wailed  through 
the  night  as  that  cry  of  a  father's  breaking  heart, 
"  0  my  son  Absalom  !  Tny  son^  my  son  Absalom. 
Would  God  I  had  died  far  thee,  0  Absalom,  my 
son,  my  son  I  "  There  are  th(*e  who  will  read 
these  lines  who  have  known  both  the  bitterness 
and  sweetness  in  a  measure,  who  have  tasted  a 
joy  such  as  an  angel  might  stoop  to  share  with 
them,  and  have  known  an  agony  which  they  were 
tempted  to  think,  as  they  writhed  under  it,  could 
be  mated  only  among  the  fiends. 

But  no  ;  it  is  not  to  the  infernal  spheres  that 
we  are  driven,  to  understand  such  a  cry  as  Da- 
vid's. Blessed  be  God,  the  joy  and  the  sorrow, 
the  sweetness  and^  the  bitterness,*  are  seen,  both 
within  the  circle  of  His  own  life.  He,  serene  in 
His  eternal  blessedness,  as  we  delight  to  picture 
Him,  has  tasted  Himself  both  a  joy  and  an  an* 


L 


216  The  Home  Life. 

guish  of  which  ours  are  but  the  shadows.  The 
whole  key  to  our  experience,  as  far  as  it  arises  out 
of  what  is  inevitable  in  life,  is  to  be  found  in  God. 
There  is  its  explanation,  there  is  its  justification, 
and  there,  if  we  rejoice  •purely  and  suffer  bravely, 
is  its  essential  glory.  We  may  not  shudder,  we 
may  not  even  shrink,  when  the  gloom  gathers 
over  us;  we  are  but  rising  into  a  divine  expe- 
rience, and  becoming  capable  of  the  most  intimate 
fellowship  with  God. 

The  home-life  is  the  sphere  of  the  most  in- 
tense of  human  experiences.  It  is  life  in  the 
keenest  tension  l^nd  to  the  loftiest  strain.  But  I 
must  again  recall  to  you  a  principle  which  I  have 
already  dwelt  upon,  that  the  home-life  gives  the 
key-note  to  all  life,  and  that  all  who  do  not  shut 
their  hearts  to  human  sympathy  and  emotion,  in 
some  measure  share  its  experience  and  taste  its 
cup.  For  all  love  is  the  same  love.  Love  of 
wife,  love  of  child,  love  of  friend,  love  of  man,  to 
the  great  paternal  natures  who  can  gather  a  wide 
company  of  Christ's  poor  brethren  to  their  em- 
brace, are  all  the  same  love,  one  in  their  fountain, 
diverse  only  in  their  currents,  and  not  other  than 
the  love  of  God.  And  he  who  has  the  heart  to 
love  has  the  heart  to  live,  and  the  heart  to  suffer. 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  21Y 

There  is  tliat  in  him,  thougli  to  the  eye  he  may 
live  mainly  solitary^  which  explains  to  him  all  a 
parent's  joys  and  sorrows,  and  gives  him  a  knowl- 
edge of  what  is  very  deep  in  the  life  of  God." 
E^one  who  have  not  denied  the  human,  can  turn 
a  deaf  ear  when  the  experience  of  loving  hearts 
is  pictured ;  they  know  both  the  delight  and  the 
anguish  in  their  measure,  and  can  enter  into  the 
inner  sanctuary  of  life. 

But  the  full  experience  the  parent  alone  can 
know,  and  those  who  have  taken  willingly  a  par- 
ent's burden  on  their  hearts.  I  have  seen  brave 
and  patient  women  crushed  down  into  speechless 
agony  by  the  dying  struggles,  or  worse,  by  the 
shame  of  their  cherished  ones ;  and  I  have  seen, 
too,  a  proud  joy  in  parents'  eyes,  which  it  were 
worth  the  peril  of  the  anguish  to  taste.  Oh,  chil- 
dren, children !  God  has  set  you  for  the  fall  and 
the  rising  again  of  the  life-springs  in  those  who 
nurture  you ;  yea,  a  sword  shall  pierce  the  heart 
of  her  that  gave  you  birth.  Happy  the  child  who 
has  never  cost  father  or  mother  the  sharpest  pang 
that  has  ever  pierced  them.  Little  dream  you,  in 
your  young  buoyant  carelessness,  how  the  hearts 
are  quivering  with  whose  strings  you  wantonly 

play,  how  the  hopes  throb  and  thrill  which  you 
10 


218  The  Home  Life. 

daily  lift  or  lower.  The  sorrows  begin  early. 
"  I  will  greatly  multi/ply  thy  sorrow  and  thy  con- 
ception,^'' In  pain  tlie  little  ones  are  bronglit 
forth ;  in  pain  and  care  they  are  nurtured.  JSTotli- 
ing  is  more  wonderful  than  the  measure  of  sorrow 
with  which  all  that  touches  our  highest  joys  is 
brought  into  the  world.  Nay,  the  little  ones  be- 
gin to  taste  it  from  the  first ;  it  is  not  long  be- 
fore their  eyes  fill  with  tears,  and  their  voice 
sobs  with  pain.  And  it  is  just  this  pain  of  a  lit- 
tle helpless  infant  which  is  so  hard  to  comprehend, 
and  so  bitter  to  bear.  "  In  sorrow  shalt  thou 
hring  forth  children'''^ — and  in  sorrow  shall  they 
be  reared. 

But  the  joys  and  the  sorrows  cluster  most 
thickly  around  the  era  of  the  home  life  which 
we  have  now  to  conteniplate,  when  the  children, 
full-grown,  must  go  forth  into  the  world.  If  one 
were  in  any  need  of  considerations  to  strengthen 
the  conviction,  that  the  moral  is  the  supreme  ele- 
ment in  the  human  constitution,  one  might  find 
it  in  the  fact,  that  all  the  cares,  joys,  and  sorrows 
of  a  parent  deepen  quite  infinitely  when  the  child 
is  growing  to  manhood  or  womanhood,  and  is 
stretching  out  a  hand  to  grasp  at  the  reins  of  life. 
There  is  nothing  which  the  young  child  ca^  do 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  219 

or  suffer  wliicli  touclies  us  to  the  quick.  The 
solemn  endowment  of  man  lies  there  enfolded,  as 
the  petals  within  the  sheath  of  the  bud ;  and  as 
it  unfolds  something  solemn  passes  out  of  it  into 
the  relations  of  the  home.  "We  enter  as  parents 
into  a  new  world  of  experience,  when  the  knowl- 
edge of  good  and  evil  is  fully  developed  in  our 
little  ones;  and  as  thej  grow  to  maturity,  and 
pass  more  and  more  out  of  the  charmed  circle  in 
which  they  are  sheltered  by  our  shield,  the  care 
deepens,  and  casts  a  shadow  over  our  lives.  Hon- 
our and  shame,  blessing  and  cursing,  heaven  and 
hell,  then  loom  in  sight.  The  young  life  so  dear 
to  us  goes  forth  from  the  land-locked  harbour  of 
our  love,  to  be  tossed  on  a  stormy  ocean,  with 
dread  perils  all  around,  and  wrecks  not  a  few  scat- 
tered on  the  shore. 

^^And  Isaac  sent  away  JacobP  The  time  had 
come;  why  or  how  in  that  special  instance  we 
need  not  stay  to  inquire.  The  time  does  come 
in  all  homes  when  the  household  must  bud  like 
the  polyp,  and  develope  into  new  households,  and 
prepare  to  occupy  new  lands  of  promise.  Life 
stirs  in  the  bud  joyously ;  but  the  old  stem  groans 
and  shudders  as  the  young  things  part.  There  is 
the  glowing  and  thrilling  life  of  spring  in  the 


220  The  Home  Life, 

young  ones ;  thei'e  is  power  astir  in  tliem  which, 
can  make  a  summer ;  "  they  shout  for  joy,  they 
also  singP  But  the  old  stock  has  the  chill  of  the 
coming  winter  in  it,  and  when  the  sons  and 
daughters  are  sent  forth,  the  winter  comes  swiftly 
on.  ^' Isaac  sent  away  JacobP  The  patriarch 
of  all  the  families  of  the  earth,  he  looms  there  in 
the  misty  morning  twilight,  a  grand  and  stately 
form.  He  sends  forth  his  son,  as  a  thousand  gen- 
erations have  sent  forth  theirs,  with  straining  eyes 
and  aching  hearts,  as  they  watched  them  vanish. 
Once  again  he  saw  his  Jacob,  when  his  eyes  were 
dim  and  his  step  tottering ;  but  the  mother  never 
again  folded  her  darling  to  her  heart.  "  Now 
therefore,  my  son,  obey  my  wiee  j  and  arise,  flee 
thou  to  Laban  my  hrotlier,  to  Ilaran  /  and  tarry 
there  a  few  days,  until  thy  brother^ s  fury  turn 
aioay.  Until  thy  brother*  s  anger  turn  away  from 
thee,  and  he  forget  that  which  thou  hast  done  unto 
him  ;  then  will  I  send  and  fetch  thee  from  thenceP 
She  paid  the  bitter  penalty  of  her  craft.  She 
won  the  birthright ;  she  lost  the  child.  So  Isaac 
sent  him  forth. 

And  that  little  prattler,  weaving  her  fairy 
chain  of  charms  around  your  heart-strings,  will 
one   day  go  forth  weeping,  but  with   a  bride's 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  221 

proud  joy  sliining  througli  her  tears.  That  brave 
boy,  whose  merry  laugh  has  been  ringing  through 
your  home,  whose  studies  you  have  watched, 
whose  sports  you  have  shared,  whose  promise  you 
have  marked  with  fond  exultation,  will  go  forth 
one  day  like  Jacob,  it  may  be  to  the  far  East  like 
him,  and  leave  you  bare,  stript  like  the  tree  of 
autumn ;  strong  and  stately  yet,  but  bare,  bare 
for  ever,  were  it  not  for  the  promise  of  the  eternal 
spring.  But  for  this  promise,  but  for  the  hope  of 
the  world  where  the  family  will  meet  again,  to 
break  up  no  more  for  ever,  I  often  think  that  the 
silent  childless  home  of  the  old  people,  when  the 
young  ones  are  gone  out  into  life,  would  be  one 
of  the  saddest  things  under  the  sun.  The  echoes 
of  loved  and  familiar  voices  silent,  the  notes  of 
the  sweetest  music  that  a  parent's  ear  can  listen 
to,  quite  still. 

But  the  getting  them  out  is,  after  all,  the 
great  work,  the  great  care  of  a  parent's  life.  To 
this  end  all  his  efforts  and  toils  are  du-ected ;  and 
when  this  end  is  gained,  he  is  ready  to  say  with 
Simeon,  ''' Lovd^  now  lettest  Thou  Thy  servant 
depart  in  jpeace,^^  "  my  work  here  is  done."  But 
new  joys  will  spring  if  he  is  but  patient.  Little 
ones  will  gather  again  around  his  knees,  of  whom 


222  The  Some  Life, 

the  joy  is  his,  but  not  the  burden.  Still,  some- 
thing is  lost  which  in  this  world  he  will  never  re- 
cover. Children's  childi^en  can  never  quite  sup- 
ply the  place  of  our  own,  for  the  very  care  and 
burden  of  the  nurture  of  children  enriches  life. 
The  joys  of  old  age  are  set  on  the  whole  in  a 
lower  key,  as  the  westering  sun  loses  something 
of  his  mid-day  fire.  But  it  has  no  need  to  be 
cheerless  or  joyless ;  while  its  gathering  shadows 
are  lit  to  the  eye  of  faith  by  a  solemn  and  holy 
lustre,  which  streams  from  the  fountain  of  eternal 
sunlight,  the  dawn  of  that  day  which  shall  break 
on  the  spirit  as  the  body  settles  into  the  night  of 
death. 

"  Getting  out  into  life,"  or  "  getting  young 
people  out  into  life."  They  are  peculiar  terms, 
though  quite  familiar,  and  their  meaning  reaches 
farther  than  appears.  ^Next  to  the  birth  of  the 
infant,  the  settling  of  the  youth  or  maiden  in  life 
is  the  great  transaction  of  the  home.  Indeed,  it 
is  a  kind  of  second  birth  to  them,  a  birth  into  a 
wider  world.  It  is  a  time  of  sore  anxiety,  and 
often  of  dire  perplexity.  The  whole  future  of  a 
human  life  seems  to  be  hanging  on  your  decision 
— a  decision  which  may  either  nurse  it  to  a  noble 
fraitfulness,  or  blight  it  to  a  premature  decay.    It 


Getting  Out  into  Life,  223 

seems  to  be  a  matter  of  vital  importance  for  you 
to  discover  the  exact  work,  or  tlie  exact  sphere, 
for  wliicli  your  son  or  daughter  may  be  most  fit- 
ted. You  watch  their  budding  gifts  with  anxious 
vigilance;  perhaps  you  rack  your  brain  with 
thought,  and  your  heart  with  care,  to  find  the  right 
work  for  them,  and  the  means  of  netting  them  to 
it ;  and  then  a  dread  may  seize  you  lest,  after  all, 
it  should  prove  the  wrong  one,  and  their  lives 
should  go  all  astray.  'Eo  doubt  it  is  on  the  whole 
the  gravest  burden  which  God  devolves  on  a  man 
— the  settlement  of  his  children  in  life.  It  is  sad 
enough  to  see  a  youth  of  promise  chained  down 
by  stern  necessity  to  dull  and  uncongenial  tasks ; 
and  there  is  nothing  gladder  than  to  see  a  young 
spirit  stirred  by  a  high  vocation  to  develope  all 
its  power.  And  when  they  see  the  wrecks  with 
which  the  coasts  of  this  life-sea  are  strewn,  well 
may  the  parents  tremble,  and  wrestle  earnestly 
and  importunately  for  the  guidance  and  the  help 
of  God. 

But  parents  may  find  some  relief  from  the  ex- 
treme pressure  of  the  burden  in  the  thought  that — 

I.  The  vital  question  concerns  their  children 
rather  than  their  lot. 


224  The  Home  Life. 

Get  them  out  in  tlie  form  of  modest,  earnest, 
industrious,  courageous,  kindly,  godly  lads  and 
girls,  and  tlieir  lot,  though  not  a  question  without 
care,  may  be  trusted,  in  some  measure,  to  settle 
itself  as  they  grow  to  maturity.  The  main  ques- 
tion concerns  what  they  are  'j  what  they  shall  do 
is  altogether  a  secondary  matter  in  the  scale.  It 
is  a  far  higher  fulfilment  of  parental  duty,  and 
far  more  blessed  in  its  fruits,  to  parent  and  to 
child,  to  get  a  sound,  brave,  high-minded  boy  or 
girl  into  a  position  which  the  world  might  reckon 
a  humble  one,  but  where  they  would  have  room 
and  opportunity  to  fight  their  way  on,  than  to  get 
an  idle,  slovenly,  luxurious  cross-grained  child 
into  the  vestibule  of  Dives,  or  on  to  the  steps  of  a 
throne.  Parents  are  altogether  too  anxious  what 
they  shall  do  with  their  children,  and  too  little 
careful  that  they  shall  be  what  is  true,  good,  and 
noble,  whatever  they  do.  The  most  consummate 
artists  make  by  their  manual  cunning  the  com- 
monest tools  more  effectual  for  working  out  their 
highest  conceptions,  than  the  finest  prove  in  the 
hands  of  a  dolt.  Turner's  etching  needle,  I  have 
heard,  was  the  prong  of  an  old  steel  fork,  stuck 
tightly  into  a  common  bit  of  wood.  And  so  you 
may  put  a  youth  of  a  certain  strain  of  nature  and 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  225 

etaracter  wliere  yon  will,  he  will  liandle  liis  life- 
tools  so  as  to  command  snccess.  Therefore  throw 
yonr  strength  into  yonr  children ;  send  them  forth 
inwardly  furnished  for  life's  battle,  out  of  that 
armoury,  the  stores  of  which  are  dispensed  by  no 
niggard  hand,  and  work  will  be  found  for  them 
more  easily  than  your  anxious  heart  can  believe. 
Faculty  rarely  waits  for  opportunity.  Do  you 
care  for  the  faculty — ^physical,  mental,  and  moral 
— and  God  in  good  time  will  show  you  its  sphere. 
Some  of  you  may  think  that  I  spoke  too  abso- 
lutely in  n  former  discourse,  about  laying  up  treas- 
ure for  children,  that  they  may  inherit  it  when 
your  work  is  done.  But  the  conviction  that,  in 
the  main,  it  does  the  devil's  work,  is  forced  upon 
me,  I  think,  every  year  more  clearly,  by  what  I 
see  of  the  miseries  which  hoarded  treasures  en- 
gender in  families,  and  the  sadly  aimless,  useless 
lives  which  they  tempt  men  and  women,  not  with- 
out native  nobleness,  to  live."  If  it  were  possible 
to  trace  the  history  of  great  fortunes  as  they  flow 
down  from  generation  to  generation,  you  would 
be  filled  with  amazement  at  the  strife  and  wretch- 
edness which  would  be  laid  bare.  The  history  of 
Spanish  Philip's  gold-glutted  empire  may  point 
the  moral.  Wlien  the  veil  is  lifted,  and  the  se- 
10=^ 


226  The  Home  Life. 

crets  of  the  monarcli's  cabinet  are  exposed,  you 
see  one  of  tlie  saddest  spectacles  which  the  sun 
shone  upon  in  those  days.  The  richest  and  most 
powerful  prince  in  Christendom  bemoaning  his 
poverty  and  impotence,  and  thinking  himself  one 
of  the  most  helpless  and  wi'etched  mortals  in  the 
world. 

At  the  same  time,  one  sees  plainly  that  it  is 
not  a  question  to  be  settled  in  a  word.  A  wise 
provision  for  old  age  becomes  an  inheritance  for 
the  children ;  unless,  indeed,  the  days  should  re- 
turn, when  men,  having  settled  the  young  ones 
safe  and  warm  in  their  new  nests,  felt  that  they 
might  fairly  take  thought  for  the  poor,  the  igno- 
rant, the  hungry,  the  shivering  ones  scattered 
about  the  world — ^the  days  in  which  men,  having 
done  their  life-work  nobly,  and  gathered  an  am- 
ple store,  founded  an  hospital,  a  refuge,  a  college, 
a  Magdalene's  home,  or  a  school  for  poor  orphans, 
and  left  the  blessing  of  such  a  legacy  to  their 
heirs.  The  thought  may  call  forth  a  smile  in 
these  days.  The  splendid  gifts  which  the  men  of 
old  time  delighted  to  offer  to  man  and  to  God, 
are  out  of  tune  with  our  habits.  The  worse  for 
us,  I  think ;  though  there  is  grave  danger — alas ! 
there  is  danger  everywhere — that  such  gifts  may 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  227 

miss  their  mark.  But  tlie  world  is  terribly  full 
of  ignorance,  nakedness,  deformity,^  starvation, 
and  misery ;  our  present  metliods  fail  to  overtake 
the  evil,  and  there  must  "be  some  way  surely  in 
which  a  man,  whose  soul  is  moved  of  Grod  to  it, 
could  devote  his  treasure  wisely  to  the  service  of 
mankind.  And  if  we  could  get  children  out  into 
the  world  with  natures  in  such  sympathy  with 
Christ's,  that  they  would  sum  up  a  parent's  good 
deeds  with  a  joy  which  uncounted  treasures  could 
not  kindle,  and  would  hear  the  blessings  of  poor 
men  on  his  name  with  a  pride  which  the  inherit- 
ance of  a  princedom  could  not  stir,  we  should  be 
far  on  towards  the  day  which  is  dim  enough  in 
the  distance  still,  when  "  the  Spirit  shall  he  poured 
upon  us  from  on  high,  and  the  wilderness  he  a 
fruitful  field,  and  the  fruitful  field  he  coiinted 
for  a  forest.  Then  judgment  shall  dwell  in  the 
wilderness,  and  righteousness  remam  in  the  fruit- 
ful field.  And  the  worh  of  righteousness  shall 
he  peace  ;  and  the  effect  of  righteousness,  quietness 
and  assuro/nce  for  ever.^^  '  I  caimot  see  that  the 
hoarding  principle,  the  founding  great  families  on 
great  fortunes,  is  such  a  grand  success,  that  it  is 
foolish  to  ask  if  there  be  not  some  more  excellent 
way.     l^or  can  I  see  how  on  any  other  principle 


228  The  Home  Life, 

than  tliis — the  abasement  of  gold  as  a  mere  pos- 
session to  the  dirt  from  which  it  springs,  and  the 
exaltation  of  truth,  righteousness,  and  love — the 
world  is  to  grow  into  the  likeness  of  a  kingdom 
of  heaven. 

I  know  that  when  all  is  said  and  done  by  a 
Christian  parent  in  earnest  about  his  duty,  grave 
and  often  crushing  cares  will  still  weigh  upon  his 
heart.  Children  will  sometimes  grow  unkindly, 
and  talent  for  any  sort  of  work  may  be  weak  and 
poor.  Words  go  but  a  little  way  to  help  any  of  us 
through  the  burden  and  the  heat  of  life.  But 
thus  much  I  may  say,  with  intense  conviction, 
that  the  more  a  parent  cares  for  what  he  lays  up 
in  the  child,  and  the  less  he  torments  himself 
about  what  he  can  lay  up  for  him,  the  richer  will 
be  the  legacy  which  he  will  bequeath.  Give  all 
diligence  to  get  the  children  out,  nobly  equipped 
for  all  good  words  and  works,  and  then  trust  God 
to  guide  them  into  the  nook  of  the  vineyard  in 
which  He  intends  them  to  labour;  for  all  such 
He  has  a  prepared  place.  It  is  wonderful  how 
the  worst  weight  of  the  burden  will  be  rolled 
away  as  you  see  strength  and  riches  gathering 
within.  Great  peace  will  fall  on  your  heart  about 
their  future,  if  your  children  are  growing  into  a 


Getting  Out  into  Life.     ^^.^        229 

likeness  wliicli  you  can  honour  and  delight  in. 
Only  look  to  the  young  shoots  that  they  be  clean 
and  straight,  with  the  sap  pure  and  plentiful 
within,  and  then— 

II.  Plant  them  out  where  they  will  have  air 
and  light  enough  to  grow. 

Remember  that  you  get  them  out  distinctly 
that  they  may  grow.  ISTot  that  they  may  grow 
rich,  famous,  or  powerful — that  is  as  God  wills ; 
but  that  they  may  grow  good,  righteous.  Christ- 
like— that  is  according  to  the  will  of  God.  The 
supreme  question  with  a  parent  in  sending  a  child 
forth,  is  growth  and  development — the  growth  of 
all  that  is  worthy  to  grow,  the  destruction  of  all 
that  is  worthy  to  be  destroyed.  The  "  being  "  of 
the  youth  or  maiden  outweighs  utterly  the  ques- 
tion of  their  getting,  or  the  place  which  they  can 
assume  in  society.  What  is  mainly  wanted  is  the 
eye  clear — as  the  Saviour  says,  "single" — ^then 
there  is  sure  to  be  light  enough  on  the  path.  God 
is  light,  and  in  Him  there  is  no  darkness  at  all. 
'His  light  is  abroad  everywhere ;  if  we  see  it  not, 
and  things  by  it,  it  is  because  there  is  darkness 
within.  If  men  get  bewildered  and  worried  about 
duty,  you  may  be  sure  that  there  is  some  mist  of 


230  The  Home  Life. 

pride,  passion,  or  selfishness  before  the  eye,  which 
makes  the  outhnes  of  things  obscure.  If  a  man 
has  an  idea  that  a  fine  position,  the  certainty  of  a 
rapid  fortune,  or  a  brilliant  marriage,  is  a  thing 
to  be  desired  for  its  own  sake,  and  to  be  weighed 
against  the  moral  disadvantages  which  it  may  en- 
tail, the  film  has  gathered  before  his  sight,  and 
there  is  no  hope  of  his  seeing  the  right  path  until 
it  be  cleared  away. 

The  great  work  of  the  Saviour  is  this  purging 
the  inward  eye  from  the  humours  of  passion  and 
selfishness ;  and  it  should  be  the  earnest  aim  of  all 
ministers  of  the  gospel,  not  to  say,  "  Do  this  or 
this,  and  it  shall  be  well " — keeping  men  ever  ex- 
pectant of  direction  and  in  perpetual  babyhood — 
but  to  clear  the  eye  of  these  mists,  that  they  may 
see  what  to  do  of  themselves.  The  eye  was  given 
for  seeing — to  discern  paths;  but  the  devil  has 
floated  illusions  before  it,  and  paralysed  the  chief 
nerve  of  its  power.  The  Lord  tells  us  that  we 
walk  in  a  vain  show ;  we  take  shadows  for  sub- 
stances, idle  imaginations  for  things.  He  seeks 
to  restore  the  lost  power  of  vision,  that  we  may* 
see  Jesus,  and  follow  Him  in  the  way. 

Follow  Him  in  caring  supremely  for  the  souls' 
health  of  your  children,  wherever  you  may  send 


Getting  Out  into" Life.  231 

them  forth.  E'o  matter  about  the  struggle,  the 
uphill  fight,  if  that  which  is  born  of  God  in  them 
gets  air  and  sunlight,  breathes  itself  in  healthy 
exercise,  and  suns  itself  in  the  glow  of  the  love 
of  God.  Bj  these  things  men  live ;  these  make 
the  inner  blessedness  which  smiles  on  through 
sorrows,  and  the  want  of  these  makes  the  inner 
cursedness  which  moans  in  purple,  and  gnaws  the 
heart-strings  even  in  the  courts  of  kings.  Take 
true  measm^e  of  this.  What  is  it  which  makes 
the  blessing  in  life,  what  makes  the  curse  ?  Look 
the  reality  in  the  face — search  your  own  con- 
science^search  the  records  of  lives  that  are  open 
to  you — search  them  fearlessly,  and  say,  is  there 
one  who  has  made  position  or  wealth  his  idol,  for 
whose  life — and  I  care  not  how  high  fortune  may 
have  lifted  him — you  would  exchange  your  own  ? 
Have  you  a  shadow  of  doubt  as  to  what  lies  at 
the  bottom  of  nine-tenths  of  the  misery  of  the 
world,  of  its  loveless  homes,  its  broken  hearts,  its 
reckless  lives,  its  dull  satiety,  its  hateful  selfish- 
ness— what  but  this  occursed  grasping  at  gold? 
Fathers  and  mothers,  who  have  children  to  get  out 
into  life,  shut  yourselves  up  to  this  question,  an- 
swer it  to  your  own  souls  as  solemnly  as  you 
would  answer  it  at  the  great  day  of  judgment,  and 


232  The  Home  Life. 

shudder  back  from  the  thought  of  sacrificing  that 
dear  heart,  all  unprophetic  of  its  future,  to  the 
demon  who  is  preying  on  the  immortal  life  of 
mankind. 

There  are  mothers,  with  a  bright  troop  of  girls 
around  them,  whose  crowning  triumph  apparently 
is,  to  "  get  them  off  their  hands."  Perhaps  they 
may  find  it  easier  to  get  them  off  their  hands 
than  off  their  hearts.  A  clever  mother,  who  gives 
her  mind  to  it,  can  manage  the  first  well  enough ; 
she  can  angle  for  a  good  jparti^  and  secure  him 
with  dexterous,  infallible  art.  "What  he  is^  if  he 
be  decently  presentable,  is  nothing ;  what  he  can 
do  to  make  a  woman's  life  what  it  was  meant  to 
be,  is  nothing.  Has  he  a  position  ?  Is  it  a  good 
match  ?  "  Then  he  must  be  secured  at  any  haz- 
ard, and  there  will  be  another  of  my  girls  off  my 
hands."  The  basest  traffic  which  is  carried  on 
upon  earth  is  carried  on  here  in  England.  It  is 
baser  here  than  elsewhere,  for  women  in  England 
know  better  what  womanhood  means.  But  it  is 
easier,  as  I  have  said,  to  get  a  daughter  off  the 
hands  than  off  the  heart.  I  have  seen  girls,  whom 
I  had  known  in  the  happy  springtime  of  their 
lives,  after  a  year  or  two  of  brilliant  marriage,  so 
worn,  so  wan,  so  unspeakably  woeful  and  hope- 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  233 

less,  that  their  look  has  quite  haunted  me.  Be- 
ware, mothers,  beware  of  the  pallid,  wrecked, 
writhing  faces  which  may  peer  through  the  gloom 
when  it  gathers  around  your  death-bed :  happy  if 
you  can  leave  them  there ;  happy  if  you  can  get 
them  oif  yom*  hearts  through  eternity. 

A  good  position!  a  good  business!  a  good 
match !  O  my  friends !  we  must  learn  from  God 
what  is  good ;  we  must  take  His  counsel  into  our 
hearts — that  counsel  which  all  the  experience  in 
the  universe  affirms,  and  must  affirm  eternally — 
before  we  can  see  our  way.  But  once  believe  in 
the  good,  "the  better  part,"  the  blessed  part, 
"  which  shall  never  be  taken  away  " — only  admit 
that  into  the  inner  sanctuary  of  the  heart — ^it  is 
like  the  unfurling  of  a  mist  from  a  sunlit  land- 
scape— ^the  ways  are  there  clear  and  straight  from 
your  very  feet. 

Do  not  mistake  the  true  scope  of  my  words. 
In  speaking  of  grasping,  of  hoarding,  I  am  not 
speaking  of  getting.  If  men  are  to  enter  busi- 
ness, they  must  set  before  themselves  a  fair  hope 
of  gain.  I  do  not  know  what  is  to  take  a  man 
do^vn  to  the  mill-wheel  daily,  but  some  clear  pros- 
pect of  success  in  buying  and  selling  and  getting 
gain.     If  a  man  works  hard,  it  wiU  be  for  "  re- 


234  The  Home  Life, 

tm-ns ; "  and  if  tliere  be  energy  and  capacity,  tlie 
returns  will  roll  freely  in  witli  tlieir  freight  of 
profit.  He  is  bound  to  take  it  with  a  tliankful 
heart,  and  to  use  it  as  God's  gift  for  elevating  and 
enlarging  the  range  of  bis  life.  N'otbing  is  a 
greater  mistake  than  to  suppose  that  every  im- 
plied or  expressed  command  in  tlie  Bible,  is  ad- 
dressed as  a  literal  direction  to  every  member  of 
the  human  race.  Every  man  is  no  more  bound 
to  "sell  all  that. he  hath  and  give  to  the  poor," 
than  he  is  bound  to  be  an  apostle.  Let  every 
man  be  as  his  gift  is ;  according  to  the  Scripture 
precept,  ''^  Let  every  man,  wherein  he  is  called^ 
therein  abide  with  GodP  But  spend  the  fruits 
of  your  labour  with  a  liberal  hand.  Spend  them 
on  whatever  enlarges  faculty,  enriches  life,  and 
mitigates  the  sorrows  of  the  poor.  Make  your 
home  larger,  more  cheerful,  more  graceful,  more 
free  to  a  wide  circle  of  friends,  with  the  gold  that 
flows  in  upon  you.  Keep  it  flowing,  and  all  will 
go  well ;  circulation  is  the  principle  of  life.  But 
don't  hoard  it  for  the  children,  who,  when  their 
eyes  are  open,  as  they  will  be  one  day,  will  curse 
it,  and  wdll  remember  with  bitterness  that  the 
only  elevation  which  you  cared  to  seek  for  tliem 
was  one  whose  base  platform  was  gold. 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  235 

One  main  condition  of  success  in  the  getting 
children  out  into  life — the  true  success,  winnino:  a 
fair  position  for  living  what  heaven  calls  life — is 
the  earnestness  which  you  may  kindle  within 
them,  by  making  them  in  a  measure  the  sharers 
of  your  confidence,  and  opening  to  them  the  se- 
cret chambers  of  your  own  heart.  I  think  that 
one  chief  element  of  the  parental  art  is  timely 
and  judicious  confidence.  The  best  preparation 
for  the  burden  and  the  struggle  into  which  get- 
ting out  into  life  will  usher  them,  is  the  knowledge 
in  some  wise  measure  of  what  it  costs  the  elders 
to  live — costs,  I  mean  in  the  highest  sense,  efibrt, 
patience,  and  hope.  But  even  about  the  lower 
things  of  life,  the  confidence  is  not  wasted.  Boys 
and  girls  are  content  to  know  that  their  parents 
manage  to  live  somehow,  that  somehow  money 
seems  to  come  when  it  is  wanted,  and  that  things 
go  on  upon  the  whole  in  a  very  natural  and  com- 
fortable way.  And  how  should  they  think  other- 
wise, unless  the  veil  is  a  little  lifted  %  Their  daily 
bread,  their  daily  pleasures,  come  to  them  much 
as  the  sunlight  comes ;  they  know  nothing  of  the 
dust  and  the  sweat  of  the  battle  that  wins  them ; 
just  as  we  think  little  of  the  burden  which  presses 
on  the  Hand  that  daily  rolls  round  the  spheres. 


236  The  Home  Life. 

It  is  well  that  as  the  intelligence  unfolds,  the 
young  people  should  know  something  of  what  the 
order  and  comfort  of  the  home  is  costing — some- 
thing of  what  the  father  and  mother  talk  over, 
with  broken  voices  and  clasped  hands  sometimes, 
when  the  children  have  left  them  and  the  cares 
of  the  day  are  done — that  they  may  not  think 
that  life  is  quite  a  holiday  pastime,  and  may  see 
that  the  noblest  thing  a  man  has  to  do  in  this 
world  is  to  toil  2)atiently  and  suiFer  bravely,  that 
others  may  be  housed,  clothed,  fed,  and  trained 
for  God. 

But  much  wisdom  is  needed  here.  Few  thing? 
are  more  purely  cruel  than  to  kill  young  hope  and 
joy.  We  may  easily  make  children  anxious,  sor 
rowful,  and  probably  distrustful,  in  their  spring, 
by  weighing  them  too  early  with  the  burden  of 
our  cares.  A  wise  parent  will  keep  the  veil  of 
the  inner  sanctuary  drawn,  lest  their  young,  gay 
footsteps  enter,  and  they  get  a  shock  which  may 
cripple  them  for  life ;  but  he  is  bound,  too,  to  lift 
it  partially,  in  wise  measures,  that  life's  richer 
meanings  may  lie  open  to  them,  and  that  they 
may  not  be  caught  at  a  disadvantage,  or  be  dis- 
heartened when  they  discover  for  themselves  how 
much  wise  and  righteous  living  may  cost.     Com- 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  237 

munion  of  spirit  between  parent  and  cliild  is  tlie 
best  training  for  life.  Treat  tliem  like  children 
when  they  are  yearning  for  the  bread  of  your 
confidence,  and  when  they  feel  the  stirring  within 
them  of  manly  and  womanly  powers,  and  you 
drive  them  to  other  and  less  helpful  comrades. 
Are  there  ?iny  veils  thicker  than  those  which  par- 
ents constantly  suffer  to  fall,  between  their  own 
inner  nature  and  the  inner  nature  of  their  chil- 
dren %  "Why  is  it  that  children  so  frequently  find 
it  easier  to  open  their  hearts  to  strangers,  than  to 
those  who  are  set  in  their  homes  to  be  to  them  in 
the  place  of  God  ?  Make  them  your  comrades  as 
Christ  made  His  disciples,  opening  to  them  your 
heart  of  hearts  as  their  natm'e  unfolds ;  wliile  at 
the  same  time  you  share  their  sports  and  pastimes, 
and  keep  yom'  interest  keen  in  all  their  pursuits 
and  pleasures ;  taking  as  much  of  your  own  boy- 
hood or  girlhood  as  you  can  on  with  you  through 
life. 

Yery  precious,  too,  may  be  the  ministry  of  a 
sister  to  a  brother  just  at  the  time  when  he  is  get- 
ting out  into  the  world ;  when  his  knowledge  of  the 
world  is  beginning  to  widen,  and  he  first  feels  the 
pressure  of  those  temptations  from  which  girls  at 
home  are  mercifully  shielded,  and  which  are  mak- 


238  The  Home  Life. 

ing  sucli  havoc  of  the  moral  and  physical  power 
of  our  people.  If  the  girls  in  onr  homes  would 
betake  themselves  more  freely  to  the  fountain  of 
which  we  have  sj)oken,  and  would  breathe  the  at- 
mosphere of  a  pure,  noble,  an|i  gracious  woman- 
hood around  them,  the  harlotries  of  the  world 
would  but  disgust  where  they  now  allure  and 
destroy.  It  seems  to  me  sadly  neglected  in  homes, 
this  power  of  brother  and  sister  to  help  each 
other,  to  bear  each  other  up  in  their  highest  en- 
deavours and  aspirations,  and  be  the  complement 
of  each  other's  life.  It  ought  to  be  the  purest 
and  most  beautiful  of  relations ;  there  is  no  bur- 
den in  it,  it  is  aU  help  and  joy.  It  is  the  best 
likeness  which  we  have  on  earth  to  the  relations 
of  the  heavenly  world,  where  "  they  neither,  ma/rry 
nor  are  given  in  marriage,  hut  are  as  the  angels 
of  God.''''  All  pure  love  in  its  first  virgin  blush 
takes  the  hue  of  this  relationship.  The  young 
lovers  are  sister  and  brother  in  the  earliest  and 
perhaps  the  happiest  days  of  their  fellowship ; 
and  it  would  be  hard  to  over-estimate  the  power 
of  a  pure  and  high-minded  sister  to  guard  her 
brother,  by  the  reverence  which  her  purity  in- 
spires, from  some  of  his  most  besetting  tempta- 
tions.    As  far  as  my  observation  has  reached,  it 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  239 

appears  to  me  that  the  purest  and  truest-liearted 
men  tliat  I  have  known,  have  been  those  whose 
sisters  have  set  before  them  the  highest  image  of 
a  woman  in  their  own  homes.  And  thus  I  come 
back  to  the  old  principle — Women,  be  yourselves, 
and  rule  the  world ! 

Young  friends,  boys  and  girls,  blooming  into 
young  men  and  women,  be  content  "  to  hasten 
slowly,"  as  the  old  Greek  proverb  has  it.  One 
of  the  most  precious  beliefs  which  a  youth  or 
maiden  can  take  with  them  into  the  arena,  is  a 
belief  in  the  virtue  of  patience,  in  the  need  of  re- 
pression, in  the  wisdom  of  deepening  the  hold  of 
the  root  fibres,  before  the  head  lifts  itself  bravely 
in  the  sun.  One  of  the  hardest  words,  naturally 
enough,  for  the  eager  young  spirit  to  believe  in  is, 
"  "Wait."  There  is  the  gleaming  many-tinted  iris, 
spanning  the  unknown  faery  world  which  the 
child  dreams  of  as  life.  A  rosy  light  floods  all 
the  air.  Eden  was  not  a  fairer  bower  to  the  first 
human  children,  than  is  the  world  to  each  of  its 
young  dreamers.  They  look  on  this  fair  earth 
and  this  wonderful  life,  as  Israel  on  the  land  of 
golden  promise ;  they  have  had  vision  of  it  too 
from  the  Pisgah  summit  of  a  child's  day  dreams. 
"  The  Paradise  is  there,  let  me  enter  it  swiftly ; 


240  The  Home  Life, 

father,  mother,  it  is  mine,  it  will  not  escape  me  if 
I  seize  it  now."  There  is  a  pining  eagerness  in 
a  youth  of  promise  to  cut  a  swift  path  to  these 
glorious  gardens,  whose  golden  apples  a  hmidred 
generations  have  missed.  "What  matter  millen- 
niums of  futile  effort,  wretched  failure,  broken 
hope  ?  "What  matter  I  Each  young  spirit  starts 
with  unabated  ardour  and  freshness  on  the  quest. 
He  is  sure  that  life  will  yield  to  him  the  secret 
which  all  have  missed.  "  The  land  of  promise  is 
there  beyond  the  river.  Corn-age !  its  cities  and 
treasm-es  will  soon  be  in  our  hands." 

And  there  is  no  girl's  paradise  without  an 
Adam,  nor  boy's  without  an  Eve.  "  Every  soul," 
says  Emerson,  "  is  a  celestial  Yenus  to  every  other 
soul."  But  boys  and  girls  believe  in  the  elective 
affinities ;  in  the  sister  soul,  the  twin,  whom  it  is 
the  aim  and  the  bliss  of  life  to  meet.  Well,  I  be- 
lieve in  it,  too.  But  it  is  rarely  that  the  twin 
souls  stumble  on  each  other  at  once.  There  is  a 
halo  round  all  things  to  the  boy's  burning  vision, 
and  the  first  fair  form  or  fair  soul — for  boys  and 
girls  care  more  about  souls  than  forms — ^which 
strikes  the  fancy,  shines  with  a  peerless  splendour. 
"  The  problem  of  Kfe  is  solved  I "  they  cry ;  "  with 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  241 

this  Adam,  this  Eve,  the  wilderness  will  be  as  the 
garden  of  the  Lord." 

And  the  parents'  word  is  "  Wait ; "  at  which 
youth  rebels.  The  cherubim  and  ^the  flaming 
sword  not  seldom  appear  through  the  mandate 
of  a  hard  necessity,  or  a  parent's  stern  behests. 
Now,  I  am  not  so  foolish  as  to  volunteer  much 
advice  to  hearts  in  such  a  case.  Indeed,  I  have 
not  much  faith  in  rides,  directions,  or  counsels  of 
any  sort,  least  of  all  about  these  high  matters, 
except  such  as  tell  on  the  being,  and  fit  it  to  clear 
its  o^vn  path,  and  to  see  its  own  way.  I  believe, 
on  the  whole,  fii-mly  in  early  marriages  and  an 
uphill  fight.  But  I  believe,  above  all,  in  waiting 
— waiting  that  costs  resolution  and  endeavour, 
and  it  may  be  sharp  pain,  that  souls  may  be  sure 
of  themselves  and  of  each  other  before  they  mate. 
Love,  like  all  other  noble  things,  gains  immensely 
by  endurance,  by  submission.  Those  whose  wise 
experience  is  holding  you  back,  in  tender  care, 
from  a  too  eager  scaling  of  the  gate  of  Paradise, 
are  reAdering  your  love  a  noble  service,  if  it  be 
rooted  deeply  in  the  soul's  elections ;  and  are  spar- 
ing you  the  sorrow  of  sorrows,  if,  as  may  well 
happen,  and  as  a  little  patience  may  prove,  it  be 
not.  Do  not  be  too  ready  to  believe  that  life's 
11 


242  The  Home  Life. 

great  problem  is  solved  in  a  moment ;  and  do  not 
grudge  effort  and  patience,  heroic  it  may  be — and 
the  unknown  heroisms  are  of  highest  account  in 
the  eye  of  Heaven — to  be  assured  that  the  prob- 
lem is  solved  rightly,  and  solved  for  ever.  The 
twin  souls  are  one  through  eternity.  But  how 
many  of  them  on  earth  are  one  ? 

With  equal  earnestness  would  I  urge  on  young 
men  going  forth  into  life  the  need  of  patience, 
that  they  may  lay  the  foundation  of  a  manly  in- 
dependence, by  toiling  long  and  thoroughly  at  the 
mere  di-udgery  of  their  calling,  before  they  think 
themselves  fit  for  the  higher  forms.  The  ignis 
fatuus  of  clever  young  men  is  a  spurious  and 
baseless  independence,  tempting  them  to  play  the 
master  before  they  have  learned  the  lessons  of  ser- 
vice thoroughly,  and  to  handle  results  before  they 
have  made  the  secrets  of  the  processes  their  own. 
Impatience  of  apprenticeship,  using  the  word  in 
a  wide  sense,  is  what  distinguishes  these  eager  and 
insubordinate  times  from  the  great  days  of  6ld. 
There  are  few  who  rule  nobly,  partly  because 
there  are  few  who  care  to  serve  long.  You  have 
to  be  builders  of  a  temple  of  life.  "  Edify  your- 
selves," "  edify  one  another,"  is  a  favourite  exhor- 
tation of  Scripture  about  life.     A  builder  grudges 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  243 

no  toil  tliat  lie  spends  on  tlie  foundations.  Edify 
your  temple  firmly  from  the  first.  Take  the  wis- 
dom of  the  elders  as  your  guide,  long  after  you 
have  felt  the  first  strong  temptation  to  think  your- 
self the  wiser.  Eefuse  not  the  yoke,  long  after 
you  have  thought  that  you  could  play  the  master 
bravely  yourself.  Build  for  a  long  future.  Life 
may  be  short  here,  but  it  is  long  there.  I^one  lay 
the  foundations  broad  and  deep  enough ;  none  be- 
lieve more  than  feebly  and  vaguely  in  eternity. 
The  masters  there,  I  think,  will  be  chosen  from 
the  band  who  were  not  afraid  of  a  life-long  ser- 
vice here.  "  Friend,  go  up  higher,"  wiU  not  be 
the  greeting  of  the  boys  and  girls  who  thought 
themselves  fit  at  the  first  start  for  the  highest 
rooms. 

For  understand,  lastly  and  solemnly,  that  you 
are  getting  out  into  a  life  whose  range  is  as  wide 
as  the  universe  and  as  long  as  eternity.  Under- 
stand farther,  that  until  you  have  let  the  solemn 
eternal  light  shine  in  upon  it,  you  cannot  compre- 
hend aright  the  most  trivial  tasks  and  the  most 
common  cares.  E^othing  with  which  man  has  to 
do  can  take  its  true  size  and  form,  unless  it  be 
projected  upon  the  horizon  of  eternity.  You  step 
oiit  into  the  great  eternal  universe,  when  you  step 


244:  The  Home  Life, 

out  of  the  fold  wliicli  sheltered  your  childliood. 
Your  every  thought,  your  every  work,  thenceforth 
has  issues  which  range  on  with  your  being  while 
that  being  endures.  Speak  merrily  to  your  soul, 
if  you  -jvill,  and  say,  "  Soul,  thou  hast  much  goods 
laid  up  for  many  years ;  take  thy  fill,  eat,  drink, 
and  be  merry."  But  remember  the  morning  after 
the  summons,  "  This  night  thy  soul  shall  be  re- 
quired of  thee ; "  remember  the  inevitable  morn- 
ing, and  the  day  or  the  night — the  day  of  bliss  or 
the  night  of  weeping — that  will  never  end.  There 
are  wonders  and  splendours,  such  as  an  angel  may 
hardly  prevail  to  look  upon,  within  the  field  of 
your  future,  as  you  tramp  through  the  round  of 
your  common  tasks — tempted  to  think,  perhaps, 
that  a  dog's  life  has  more  interest  and  variety 
than  yours.  Make  it  a  dog's  life,  and  they  vanish 
from  the  field  of  your  vision  for  ever.  Make  it  a 
man's  life,  and  pay  the  cost  for  a  little  space — 
"  endure  hardness,  as  a  good  soldier  of  Jesus 
Christ " — and  one  day  you  will  range  with  exult- 
ing triumphant  power  through  all  the  pathways 
of  the  new  creation,  and  search  out  the  glory 
which  is  wisely  veiled  from  mortal  sight,  whose 
unveiling  will  be  the  apocalj^se  of  eternity.  Get 
out  into  life  with  the  solemn,  ennoblmg  sense  that 


Getting  Out  into  Life.  245 

yon  are  getting  out  into  life  eternal,  and  weigh 
every  pleasure  and  pain  of  this  world  in  the  bal- 
ances whose  measures  are  square  with  the  stand- 
ards of  God. 


IX. 

THE    FAMILY   MI:N'ISTEY. 

"  When  the  ear  heard  me^  then  it  hlessed  me ;  and  when  the 
eye  saw  me,  it  gave  witness  to  me;  because  I  delivered 
the  poor  that  cried,  and  the  fatherless,  and  him  that  had 
none  to  help  him.  The  blessing  of  him  that  was  ready 
to  perish  came  upon  me :  and  I  caused  the  widow''s  heart 
to  sin{f  for  joy.  I  put  on  righteousness,  and  it  clothed 
me :  my  judgment  was  as  a  rohe  and  a  diadem.  I  was 
eyes  to  the  Hind,  and  feet  was  I  to  the  lame.  I  was  a 
father  to  the  poor,  and  the  cause  which  I  Tcnew  not  I 
searched  out.^^ — Job  xxix.  11-16. 

"  Fkeely  ye  have  received,  freely  give^''  is  the 
Christiaii  law.  Blessed  with  a  dear  home  life 
yourselves,  piu'ify  and  gladden  poor  homes  around. 
The  great  hope  for  society  is,  that  the  influence 
of  a  pure  and  noble  home  life  may  descend,  and 
flow  through  all  the  squalid,  wretched  households, 
which  are  the  fruitful  mothers  of  crime  and  sor- 
row. A  Christian  household  ill  comprehends  its 
vocation,  if  it  is  not  training  the  boys  and  girls 


The  Family.  Ministry,  247 

which  grow  up  in  it,  to  be  wise  as  well  as  diligent 
and  devoted  ministers  to  the  poor.  The  nature 
and  method  of  this  ministry  will  be  the  topic  of 
the  present  discourse. 

It  is  nobly  sketched  in  the  words  which  I  have 
taken  for  my  text.     The  chapter  contains  proba- 
bly the  finest  picture  of  the  life  of  an  eastern  pa- 
triarch, which  has  ever  been  painted  by  the  hand 
of  man.     The  whole  book  of  Job,  in  fact,  lets  us 
into  the  secret  of  .an  age  and  a  mode  of  life  which 
is  about  the  polar  opposite  of  our  own.     The  pa- 
triarchal age  is  but  lightly  touched  in  the  histori- 
cal books  of  Scripture.     Or  rather,  1  should  say, 
what  is  laid  about  it  has  a  distinct  reference  to  a 
Divine  purpose  which,  running  through  it,  hast- 
ened on  to  a  goal  beyond.     The  book  of  Genesis 
is  but  the  exordium  of  the  book  of  the  legal  dis- 
pensation, which  itself  is  but  the  vestibule  of  the 
dispensation  of  the  gospel.     It  contains  notices 
of  the  life  and  manners  of  the  patriarchal  age 
which  are  of  the  highest  value,  as  it  traces  the 
fortunes  of  the  elect  race,  to  which  was  confided 
the  leading  part  in  the  drama  of  the  history  of  the 
world.     But  in  the  book  of  Job  we  have  notices 
which  are  more  valuable  still.     Here  the  author 
dwells  fondly  on  the  patriarchal  age  for  its  own 


248  The  Borne  Life. 

sake,  and  lingers  over  its  manners  and  simple  in- 
cidents with  a  tender  and  loving  hand.  Job  and 
tlie  race  to  which  he  belonged  are  out  of  the  line 
of  the  elect  people.  They  have  but  a  remote 
kindred  with  them,  and  their  life  and  that  of  their 
w^hole  race  could  be  but  at  the  best  an  episode  in 
history.  There  is  no  pressing  forward  to  a  pur- 
pose here.  The  details  are  touched  with  the  skill 
and  care  of  an  artist  who  has  time  and  room  to 
present  a  complete  portrait ;  and  the  result  is  a 
picture  of  the  manners,  the  thoughts,  the  life,  of 
an  old  patriarchal  chieftain  in  his  tribe,  which  is 
unique  in  history. 

It  seems  to  have  been  painted  by  a  man  who 
was  familiar  with  a  state  of  society  which  some- 
what sadly  contrasted  with  it.  As  Tacitus,  in  the 
coiTupt  society  of  the  Empire,  lingers  fondly  over 
the  pure  and  simple  morals  of  the  German  tribes, 
so  the  writer  of  this  book,  full  of  the  cares  and 
burdens  of  a  national  statesman,  and  observant 
of  the  vices  and  miseries  of  national  life,  dwells 
on  this  image  of  a  grand  old  Edomite  patriarch, 
as  a  witness  and  a  warning  to  his  times.  If  the 
writer  was  Moses — I  am  not  ignorant  of  the  diffi- 
culties attaching  to  the  supposition,  but  they  seem 
to  me  far  from  decisive — we  can  understand  it 


The  Family  Ministry.  249 

perfectly.  To  a  man  steeped  in  all  tlie  learning 
of  the  Egyptians,  and  sated  with  their  splendid 
and  luxurious  civilisation,  it  would  be  like  a 
breath  of  pure,  fresh  mountain  air,  to  come  across 
the  record  of  such  a  life.  What  a  grand  picture 
of  the  Bedouin  chief,  the  father  of  his  tribe,  is 
presented  here:  ''''Moreover^  Job  continued  his 
jparaMe^  and  said^  Oh  that  I  were  as  in  months 
^past,  as  in  the  days  when  God  preserved  me  • 
when  His  candle  shined  uj)on  tny  head,  and  when 
hy  His  light  I  walked  through  darkness  ;  as  I  was 
in  the  days  of  my  youth,  when  the  secret  of  God 
was  uj)on  my  tabernacle  /  when  the  Almighty  was 
yet  ivith  me,  when  my  children  were  about  me  / 
when  I  washed  my  steps  with  butter,  and  the  rock 
poured  me  out  rivers  of  oil  j  when  I  went  out  to 
the  gate  through  the  city,  when  I  prepared  my  seat 
in  the  street  !  The  young  men  saw  me,  and  hid 
themselves  ^  and  the  aged  arose,  and  stood  up. 
The  princes  refrained  talking,  and  laid  their 
hand  on  their  mouth.  The  nobles  held  their  peace, 
and  their  tongue  cleaved  to  the  roof  of  their  mouth. 
When  the  ear  heard  me,  then  it  blessed  me  /  a/}id 
when  the  eye  saw  me,  it  gave  witness  to  me  /  be- 
cause I  delivered  the  poor  that  cried,  and  the 
fatherless,  and  him  that  had  none  to  Jielp  him» 
11* 


250  The  Home  Life, 

The  Messing  of  Mm  that  was  ready  to  ^perish  came 
upon  me:  a7icl  I  caused  the  widow's  heart  to  sing 
for  joy.  Ijcnct  on  righteousness,  and  it  clothed 
me :  my  judgment  was  as  a  robe  and  a  diadem.  I 
was  eyes  to  the  Mind,  and  feet  was  I  to  the  lame. 
I  was  a  father  to  the  poor  ',  and  t1ie  cause  which  I 
Jciiew  not  I  searched  out.  And  I  hraJce  the  jaws 
of  the  wiclced,  and  jplucTied  the  spoil  out  of  his 
teeth.  Then  I  said,  I  shall  die  in  my  nest,  and  I 
shall  multiply  my  days  as  the  sand.  My  root  was 
spread  out  hy  the  waters,  and  the  dew  lay  all  night 
upon  my  hranch.  My  glory  was  fresh  in  me, 
and  my  how  was  renewed  in  my  hands.  Unto  me 
men  gave  ear,  and  waited,  and  Icept  silence  at  my 
counsel.  After  my  words  they  spake  not  again  / 
and  my  speech  dropped  upon  them.  And  they 
waited  for  me  as  for  the  rain  /  and  they  opened 
their  mouth  wide  as  for  the  latter  rain.  If  I 
laughed  on  them,  they  helieved  it  not;  and  the 
light  of  my  countenance  they  cast  not  down.  I 
chose  out  their  way  and  sat  chief,  and  dwelt  as  a 
Icing  in  the  army,  as  one  that  comforteth  the 
mourners  "  (Job  xxix.  1-25). 

This  picture  belongs  to  a  time  when  govern- 
ment was — as  all  government  was  once — ^paternal. 
Much  which  it  is  hard  to  characterise  as  other 


The  Family  Ministry,        ^        251 

than  pure  nonsense,  lias  been  written  about  the 
social  contract,  and  probably  by  the  sentimental 
infidels  whose  works  prepared  the  way  for  the 
first  French  Revolution.  The  original  social  con- 
tract, even  the  idea  of  a  compact — except  such  as 
grows  out  of  pre-existing  relations,  as  was  the  case 
with  the  pilgrim  fathers — is  a  mere  fiction.  The 
fontal  type  of  all  government,  the  mould  in  which 
it  was  originally  cast,  is  the  rule  of  a  father  in  his 
home.  Men  soon  outgrow  this.  Society  gets  too 
wide,  and  too  wise.  It  becomes  too  capable  of 
self-government  for  one  man  to  rule  it  father-like ; 
no  man  can  sustain  this  relation  to  a  wide  and 
cultivated  community  of  his  fellow-men.  The 
effort  becomes  the  parent  of  the  most  absolute 
and  soul-debasing  tyranny,  as  may  be  seen  at  this 
moment  in  France.  Society,  conscious  that  it  has 
outgrown  the  paternal  rule,  has  all  sorts  of  devices 
to  get  itself  tolerably  governed ;  but  they  all  blun- 
der utterly  in  the  way,  and  miss  utterly  of  the 
end,  if  they  fail  to  discern  that  the  fundamental 
idea  of  government  is  the  father's  rule ;  and  that 
the  kind  of  order  which  needs  to  be  established 
in  human  society  is  the  loving  order  which  a  father 
maintains  in  a  home. 

JSTow,  no  government,  as  government  must  be 


252       •  The  Home  Life, 

in  a  complicated  and  liigUy  civilised  community- 
like  ours,  can  fulfil  tliis  function — can  take  tliis 
fatherly  oversight  of  men.  A  chieftain  of  a  tribe 
may  do  it;  a  ruler  of  a  great  nation  cannot. 
And  one  would  watch  very  sadly  the  growth  of  a 
community  to  a  magnitude  which  precludes  the 
exercise  of  the  paternal  function  by  the  govern- 
ment, and  makes  the  freest  independence  of  the 
individual  members,  even  the  basest  and  most 
foolish,  the  test  of  the  development  of  the  people, 
but  for  the  belief  that  a  Wiser  and  Stronger  than 
any  human  father  is  ruling ;  and  that  He  is  em- 
ploying the  various  organs  of  the  national  life  to 
make  His  fatherly  will  the  governing  prmciple  in 
the  conduct  of  its  public  affairs.  If,  as  man  drops 
the  sceptre  and  confesses  that  the  task  of  rule  is 
too  hard,  we  cannot  believe  that  a  higher  Hand 
is  grasping  it,  dark  indeed  would  be  our  vision  of 
the  aspect  and  prospect  of  the  world. 

And  that  God  may  rule  in  states,  that  the 
moral  element  of  the  problem  may  not  be  lost 
sight  of,  that  the  Fatherly  care  and  influence  may 
not  quite  vanish  from  the  wider  sphere  of  the  na- 
tional life,  God  has  founded  an  institution,  in 
which  spii'itual  elements  and  interests  are  predom- 
inant ;  which  takes  His  Word  as  its  statute-book 


The  Family  Ministry.  253 

of  commandment,  and  seeks  to  be  filled  with  His 
Spirit  as  the  principle  of  its  life.  As  the  secular 
sphere  developes  itself  according  to  the  instincts 
and  visible  interests  of  men,  the  Church  is  or- 
dained to  keep  God's  truth  before  it,  and  to  bring 
the  benign  influence  of  the  Father  and  the  Ke- 
deemer  of  spirits  to  bear  on  the  order  and  prog- 
ress of  society.  The  Church  is  not  other  than  the 
world  in  God's  ultimate  thought  and  purpose. 
Eut  so  long  as  the  world  seeks  worldly  inspira- 
tion in  all  its  activities  and  achievements,  God 
purposes  that  there  shall  be  those  in  it  who  shall 
bear  witness  for  higher  truths,  and  bring  higher 
influences  to  bear  on  men.  The  end  will  be 
reached,  and  the  two  spheres  will  blend  in  one, 
when  "  None  shall  hurt  and  none  shall  destroy  in 
all  God's  holy  mountain ;  hut  the  earth  shall  he 
full  of  the  TcnowUdge  of  the  Lord^  as  the  waters 
cover  the  seaP 

By  the  Church,  I  mean  simply,  the  body  of 
believers  who  yield  themselves  to  be  the  organs 
of  God's  Spirit  in  the  world,  whose  desu^e  and 
aim  is  to  make  His  influence,  as  the  Father  and 
Redeemer,  the  ruling  power  irf  society.  The 
Chmxh  can  bring  this  Fatherly  element  into  the 
ordering  and  government  of  mankind,  because  it 


254  The  Rome  Life. 

is,  wliat  no  mere  ruler  or  magistrate  can  be,  God's 
instrument.  His  organ,  ratlier,  for  the  spiritual 
rule  and  guidance  of  men.  The  Christian  ele- 
ment in  society — the  fontal  fire  of  which  is  kept 
pure  and  bright  on  the  hearth  of  the  Christian 
household — seeks  to  supply  the  want,  of  which, 
as  society  enlarges  its  borders,  grows  wider,  wiser, 
and  more  complex,  it  becomes  painfully  conscious 
— the  want  of  a  Father's  rule.  Job  was  priest 
and  king  in  his  tribe ;  Abraham  was  priest  and 
king  in  his  family — ^the  germ  of  a  tribe ;  but  no 
man  or  men  can  be,  even  in  the  measure  which 
was  possible  for  them,  priest  and  king  to  a  nation 
or  to  the  world.  The  one  Priest  and  King  of  hu- 
manity is  Christ ;  and  His  organ,  His  body,  is  the 
Church,  which  is  destined  one  day  to  transform 
the  world,  and  then  to  be  lost  in  it.  The  earthly 
fountains  of  its  vital  power  are  Christian  homes. 
They  are  the  eyes  and  the  hands  of  the  Church ; 
they  feed  its  strength,  and  they  conduct  it ;  they 
are  the  organs  of  its  ministry,  the  channels  of  its 
life. 

Training  for  ministry  to  the  world  should  be 
one  main  featiire  of  the  higher  culture  of  Chris- 
tian households.  To  study  and  fulfil  this  patri- 
archal function  is  one  great  purpose  of  their  exist- 


The  Family  Ministry.  255 

euce.  I  confine  myself  in  this  connexioii  to  the 
consideration  of  tlie  ministry  to  tlie  poor,  which 
is  so  graphically  set  forth  in  the  text ;  for  it  is  in 
connexion  with  the  poor  that  the  most  difficult 
problems  of  society  arise.  How  thoroughly  it  is 
recognised  as  the  chief  w^ork  of  the  Divine  Kuler, 
to  right  the  wrongs  and  relieve  the  miseries  of  the 
poor,  a  thousand  passages  of  the  Scripture  declare 
as  emphatically  as  this :  "  He  shall  have  dominion 
also  from  sea  to  sea,  and  from  the  river  unto  the 
ends  of  the  earth.  They  that  dwell  in  the  wilder- 
ness shall  how  before  Him  /  and  His  enemies  shall 
lioh  the  dust.  The  Mngs  of  Tarshish  and  of  the 
isles  shall  hring  presents :  the  tings  of  Shela  and 
Sela  shall  offer  gifts.  Yea,  all  Mngs  shall  fall 
down  hefore  him  i  all  nations  shall  serve  Him. 
For  He  shall  deliver  the  needy  when  he  crieth; 
the  poor  also,  and  him  that  hath  no  helper.  He 
shall  spare  the  poor  and  needy,  and  shall  save  the 
sotds  of  the  needy.  He  shall  redeem  their  soul 
from  deceit  and  violence  ;  and  precious  shall  their 
blood  he  in  His  sight "  (Ps.  Ixxii.  8-14). 

I  purpose  to  offer  some  practical  remarks  on 
the  passage  prefixed  to  this  discourse,  to  stimulate 
and  guide  this  ministry  of  the  Christian  household 


256  The  Home  Life. 

— the  microcosm  of  which  the  Church  is  the  ma- 
crocosm-— as  much  as  is  in  my  power. 

I.  The  duty  of  the  Church,  the  Christian  ele- 
ment of  society,  to  search  out  the  cause  of  the 
poor,  and  to  be  a  father  to  them. 

I  dwell  specially  on  the  searching  it  out.  The 
energy  and  the  self-denial,  the  patience  and  the 
power  of  endurance,  which  the  searching  out  the 
cause  or  the  case  of  the  poor  demands,  can  be 
supplied  ill  constant  measure  but  from  one  spring. 
I  imagine  that  if  we  could  have  set  before  the 
eye  of  the  mind  at  any  moment,  as  vividly  as  if 
it  were  before  the  natural  eye,  the  miseries,  the 
torments,  the  agony  of  body,  mind,  and  spirit, 
which  millions  of  our  fellow-creatures  are  endur- 
ing through  poverty  and  what  springs  *fr"om  it,  we 
should  rush  to  the  rescue  with  mad  haste,  lest  God 
should  inquire  for  all  these  groans,  these  tears, 
this  blood,  at  our  hands.  ITo  sleep  for  us  to-night, 
till  some  naked  ones  had  been  clpthed,  some  starv- 
ing ones  had  been  fed,  some  shivering  ones  had 
been  cherished  before  a  cheery  fire,  and  a  taste  at 
least  had  been  given  to  some  poor  outcast  of  all 
that  God,  in  His  infinite  goodness  to  us,  has 
granted  us  in  our  home.     But,  not  seeing  it,  we 


The  Family  Ministry.  257 

realize  it  but  dimly.  We  know  well  enougli  tliat 
tliere  is  &iic1l  a  thing  as  tlie  misery  of  the  poor  in  the 
background,  just  as  we  know  that  there  is  Death. 
We  never  search  for  him,  but  we  feel  sometimes 
his  chill  breath,  and  see  his  awful  shadow  flung 
over  the  glowing  landscape  of  our  lives.  And  so 
this  dread  shadow  of  poverty  crosses  us  sometimes, 
but  we  hasten  out  of  its  gloorti  into  the  warm  sun- 
light once  more.  It  is  one  of  the  things  which 
we  are  prone  to  put  by  in  the  dark  comer,  and 
look  at  as  little  as  we  may.  But  now  let  us  hear 
God's  word :  "If  thou  forlear  to  deliver  them 
that  are  drawn  unto  death,  and  those  that  are 
ready  to  he  slain  /  if  thou  say  est,  Behold,  we  Tcnew 
it  not  I  doth  not  He  that  pondereth  the  heart  con- 
sider it  f ,  and  He  that  heejpeth  thy  soul,  doth  not 
He  Tcnow  it?  and  shall  not  He  render  to  every 
man  according  to  his  worTcs^^  (Prov.  xxiv.  11,  12) 
It  is  our  business,  our  plainest  duty,  to  search 
it  out.  The  world  does  not  know,  and  half  of  it 
does  not  care.  But  we  are  bound  to  know.  The 
home  is  a  field  of  the  noblest  culture,  and  it  is  the 
organ  of  the  divinest  ministry.  Let  it  neglect 
the  last,  and  by  .the  sternest  of  all  laws,  the  first 
is  lost.  The  home  is  constantly  called  the  nur- 
sery of  the  Church.     It  is  something  more.     The 


258  The  Home  Life. 

old  Jewish  synagogue  was  constituted  by  families. 
So  in  a  very  liigh  sense  were  the  old  Puritan 
cliurclies.  The  home  is  the  church,  not  in  minia- 
ture but  in  microcosm ;  that  is,  it  is  a  complete 
Church  within  its  sphere.  And  through  the 
home  and  its  Christian  charities  the  ministry  of 
the  Chm'ch  must  be  mainly  accomplished.  And 
here  is  its  first  office,  to  search  out  the  cause  of 
the  poor.  "We  are  bound  to  know  it,  and  to  let 
the  world  know  it.  "We  are  bound  to  bring  the 
dark  facts  out  of  their  darkness,  and  set  them  be- 
fore the  world  in  the  full  light  of  day.  One  of 
the  first  duties  of  a  Christian  household  is  to  re- 
solve to  know  for  itself,  and  to  make  others  know, 
the  state  of  its  poor  around.  I  say  its  poor. 
''The poor  ye  have  always  with  you.^"^  They  are 
Christ's  charge  to  those  whom  He  has  enriched 
and  blessed.  Its  poor  are  those  within  sound  of 
its  voice,  within  touch  of  its  hand.  The  only,  the 
all-sufficient  plea  is  poverty  and  wretchedness; 
our  sect,  our  dependents,  our  neighbours ! — Christ 
knows  nothing  of  such  limitations.  He  tells  us 
only  of  "  the  poor."  Even  the  Jew,  narrow  and 
exclusive  as  his  disposition  is  popularly,  but  most 
falsely,  held  to  have  been,  did  not  dare  to  limit 
his  responsibility  to  the  poor  even  of  his  own  na- 


Tlie  Family  Ministry,  259 

tion.  "  And  when  ye  reap  the  harvest  of  yoii/r 
land^  thou  shalt  not  wholly  reap  the  corners  of  thy 
field^  neither  shalt  thou  gather  the  gleanings  of  thy 
harvest.  And  thou  shalt  not  glean  thy  vineyard^ 
neither  shalt  thou  gather  every  grape  of  thy  vine- 
yard;  thou  shalt  leave  them  for  the  poor  o/nd 
stranger ;  I  am  the  Lord  your  God,  ....  And 
if  a  stranger  sojourn  with  thee  in  your  land,  ye 
shall  not  vex  him.  But  the  stranger  that  dwelleth 
with  you,  shall  he  unto  you  as  one  lorn  among 
you,  and  thou  shalt  love  him  as  thyself  'j  for  ye 
were  strangers  in  the  land  of  Egypt.  I  am  the 
Lord  your  God''  (Lev.  xix.  9,  10,  33,  34).  ''At 
the  end  of  three  years  thou  shalt  Iring  forth  all 
the  tithe  of  thine  increase  the  same  year,  and  shalt 
lay  it  up  within  thy  gates,  and  the  Levite  (because 
he  hath  no  part  nor  inheritance  with  thee),  and 
the  stranger,  and  the  fatherless,  and  the  widow, 
which  are  within  thy  gates,  shall  come,  and  shall 
eat,  and  he  satisfied  y'  that  the  Lord  thy  God  may 
Mess  thee  in  all  the  work  of  thine  hand  which  thou 
doesV'  (Deut.  xiv.  28,  29).  God  tauglit  liim  the 
secret  of  a  large-hearted  charity  ;  and  shall  we  be 
more  narrow  and  selfish  than  the  Jew  ?  God  for- 
bid. "  For  we  Tcnow  the  grace  of  our  Lord  Jesus, 
how  that  though  He  was  rich,  yet  for  our  saTces  He 


260  The  Home  Life, 

'became  poor,  that  we  through  His  poverty  might 
l)e  rich.^'' 

But  we  live  in  a  strangely  complicated  state 
of  society.  It  is  said  that  one  half  of  the  world 
does  not  know  how  the  other  half  lives.  It  is  a 
liberal  estimate.  How  many  neither  know  nor 
care  ?  It  was  otherwise  of  old.  Job  knew  every 
poor  one,  every  vicious  one,  in  his  tribe ;  he  knew 
how  to  deal  with  them,  and  he  knew  further  that 
the  responsibility  of  their  condition  rested  in  some 
serious  measure  at  his  door.  The  old  patriarchal 
feeling  -survived  in  a  Roman  bishop  as  late  as  the 
end  of  the  sixth  century.  A  man  died,  starved 
to  death,  in  the  streets  of  Eome,  and  Gregory  the 
Great,  the  Roman  bishop,  imposed  on  himself  the 
heaviest  penances,  and  interdicted  himself  from 
the  discharge  of  the  sacred  offices,  because  it  had 
been  possible  that  such  a  thing  should  happen 
even  in  the  vast  city  in  which  he  was  Father, 
Papa,  Pope. 

In  the  middle  ages  something  of  this  close 
oversight  was  possible.  Rich  and  poor  lived 
much  together  in  the  same  quarters,  in  the  same 
streets.  In  our  county  towns  you  will  still  see, 
where  railroad  life  has  not  effaced  the  last  traces 
of  the  past,  the  noble  mansion,  the  town-house  of 


The  Family  Ministry,  261 

the  great  connty  family,  with  a  hovel  leaning 
against  its  side.  In  truth  towns  grew  originally, 
through  the  clustering  of  the  poor  for  work  and 
shelter  near  the  great  man's  castle  gate.  And 
you  will  constantly  see  still  a  row  of  poor  cot- 
tages, then  a  handsome  house  or  two,  and  then  a 
row  of  poor  cottages  again.  The  rich  and  the 
poor  lived  near  each  other,  and  there  was  a  fair 
chance  at  any  rate  of  a  rich  man's  knowing  the 
poor  man's  needs.  But  our  luxurious  living  has 
changed  all  that.  We  have  our  rich  quarters 
and  our  poor  quarters,  with  few  ministering  foot- 
steps passing  between.  We  have  our  squares  of 
splendid  palaces,  without  the  disfigurement  of  one 
poor  man's  dwelling ;  we  have  wide  tracts  of  pen- 
ury, vice,  and  wretchedness,  without  the  orna- 
ment of  one  rich  man's  home.  The  rich  draw 
together,  and  the  poor  are  driven  together ;  and  a 
great  gulf  has  been  opened  between  them,  which 
benign  ministries  have  begun  to  fill. 

But  our  Tyburnias  and  Belgravias,  whose 
dreary  monotony  is  some  penalty  on  their  splen- 
dour, involve  inevitably  our  Kookeries  and  Kag- 
fairs.  Every  great  "  quarter "  built  for  riches, 
means  that  poverty,  want,  withering  toil  and  bit- 
ter sorrow,  have  extended  their  area  too.     Tlie 


262  The  Home  Life, 

natural  tendencies  of  tlie  age  are  to  the  separa- 
tion of  tlie  classes.  The  Christian  office  is  to  wed 
them  again,  to  reintroduce  them  to  each  other, 
and  to  make  them  feel  in  more  loving  ways  than 
God's  judgments — such  as  cholera,  typhus,  small- 
pox, and  the  like — employ,  that  they  belong  to 
each  other,  and  that  at  the  bottom  their  interests 
are  one. 

And  the  first  step  to  this  is  to  seek  them  out ; 
to  discover  poverty  and  misery  in  their  lairs,  and 
bring  them  out  before  the  face  of  the  world,  into 
the  light  of  day.  Every  Christian  household 
ought  to  have  its  little  band  of  searchers,  and 
ought  to  make  known  in  quiet  ways,  as  opportu- 
nity ofiers,  the  estate  of  the  poor.  The  truth  is, 
it  only  needs  to  be  known  to  be  mended.  The 
searching  out  is  the  chief  matter.  The  City 
Missions  and  kindred  agencies  have  searched 
out  the  condition  of  the  masses  of  our  city  poor 
so  effectually,  and  made  known  so  widely  the 
knowledge  they  have  gained,  that  there  is  a  new 
stir  through  the  whole  sphere  of  society,  and  a 
thousand  hands  are  now  stretched  forth  in  every 
direction  to  seek  and  to  save.  And  Christ  is  the 
moving  spirit  of  it  all,  though  many  name  not  the 
name  of  Christ  while  they  are  busy  in  the  work. 


The  Family  Ministry.  263 

But  Cliristianity  has  done  thus  mucli  for  Christian 
society;  the  words,  ''Am  I  my  'brother's  'keejperf'' 
can  never  again  be  uttered  as  a  bar  to  the  minis- 
try of  society  to  its  poor.  The  world  now  could 
not  live  on  and  go  about  its  tasks,  were  it  set 
sternly  face  to  face  with  their  actual  condition. 
The  evil  once  known  in  all  its  dark  dimensions, 
some  help  must  be  found,  some  cure. 

Be  it  yours  to  know,  that  you  may  tell.  Don't 
be  satisfied  with  the  vague  knowledge  with  which 
multitudes  of  professed  philanthropists  content 
themselves.  See  it  for  yourselves,  women  of 
Christian  households,  while  the  men  are  about 
their  daily  tasks ;  see  it  for  yourselves  and  touch 
it,  and  if  is  a  bitter  sight,  don't  turn  away.  Let 
the  bitterness  sink  into  your  heart.  It  was  a 
bitter  sight  to  Christ,  but  He  did  not  turn  from 
it ;  He  became  its  fellow ;  He  bore  all  the  bitter- 
ness of  it  life-long,  and  now  He  sends  you.  His 
ministers,  to  help  Him  by  Christian  charity  to 
bear  all  its  bitterness  away.  Study  the  problem 
closely ;  acquaint  yourself  as  among  your  first  and 
most  sacred  Christian  duties,  with  the  cause  of 
your  poor. 

II.  See  that  you  bear  a  hand  to  help  it. 


264  The  Home  Life. 

I  find  the  deepest  suggestion  on  tliis  point  from 
tlie  narrative  in  Mark:  ^^ And  straightway  the 
father  of  the  child  cried  out,  and  said  with  tears, 
Lord,  Lhelieve  j  help  Thou  mine  u^ibelief  When 
Jesus  saw  that  the  people  came  running  together, 
He  rebuked  the  foul  spirit,  saying  unto  him.  Thou 
dumb  and  deaf  spirit,  I  charge  thee,  come  out  of 
him,  and  enter  no  more  into  him.  And  the  spirit 
cried,  and  rent  him  sore,  and  came  out  of  him : 
and  he  was  as  one  dead ;  insomuch  that  many 
said.  He  is  dead.  But  Jtsus  took  him  hy  the 
hand,  and  lifted  him  up  /  and  he  arose  "  (Mark  ix. 
24-27). 

Hand  help !  That  is  what  the  poor  want ; 
that  is  what  the  Lord  calls  for ;  that  is  what  the 
Church  must  afford,  if  she  is  to  give  free  play  and 
healthy  exercise  to  her  noblest  powers.  Under- 
Btand  what  I  mean.  Giving  is  the  smallest  and 
easiest  part  of  Christian  charity.  Time  is  far 
more  precious,  and  effort  is  far  more  precious, 
than  money,  to  hard-worked  men.  And  money 
may  be  given  lavishly  to  save  time  and  trouble, 
and  may  very  easily  be,  nay,  it  too  constantly  is, 
a  curse  instead  of  a  blessing  to  the  poor.  The 
Lord  had  no  money  to  give,  nor  would  He  make 
any.     This  last  is  among  the  most  significant  feat- 


The  Family  Ministryt  265 

ures  of  His  ministry.  And  the  poorest  Christian 
ministers  are  probably  those  who,  at  this  moment, 
are  doing  the  most  for  the  help  of  the  poor.  The 
poor  are  commonly  their  own  worst  enemies. 
Their  own  improvidence,  carelessness,  and  vice, 
share  fully  with  the  condition  of  society  the  re- 
•sponsibility  of  their  state.  They  are  very  far 
from  being  their  true  friends  who  are  afraid  to 
tell  them  so — who  will  throw  a  sop  of  charity  to 
meet  their  momentary  need,  and  to  win  their 
passing  gratitude,  instead  of  tenderly  but  firmly 
pressing  on  them  the  recognition  of  the  evil  hab- 
its and  passions,  out  of  which,  after  all,  nine- 
tenths  of  their  miseries  spring.  To  cure  an  evil 
habit,  to  brighten  a  sullen  temper,  to  conquer  a 
vicious  propensity,  in  the  poor  subjects  of  your 
ministry,  is  to  give  something  which  is  infinitely 
more  precious  than  gold ;  it  is  a  gift  which  they 
may  bear  on  with  them  into  eternity. 

And  to  do  this  you  must  be,  like  Job,  a  friend 
to  them.  You  must  hear  the  narrative  of  their 
circumstances,  you  must  observe  carefully  their 
habits,  and  you  must  speak,  as  only  a  friend  can 
speak,  home  to  their  consciences  and  their  hearts. 
That  is  putting  a  hand  to  the  work.  Some  put 
only  a  face  to  it.  They  enter,  with  an  expression 
12 


266  The  Home  Life, 

of  lofty  condescension,  tlie  poor  man's  garret,  and 
look  infinite  superiority  while  tliey  lecture  him  on 
his  follies  and  sins.  I  am  persuaded  that  very 
much  of  the  bitterness,  with  which  intelligent  and 
independent  working  men  speak  of  those  whom 
they  call  "  the  saints,"  is  due  to  the  quiet  inso- 
lence with  which  pious  visitors,  often  with  the 
best  intentions,  intrude  their  presence  and  advice 
at  unseemly  seasons  in  humble  homes.  Those 
who  will  take  poverty  by  the  hand  must  take  the 
burden  of  it  upon  them,  and  will  be  made  solemn 
and  sad  as  they  feel  its  weight.  ISTor  must  it  be 
made  altogether  the  work  of  the  women,  though 
they  will  be  the  chief  almoners  of  the  Church 
and  of  heaven.  Time  may  be  scarce  and  costly 
with  the  prosperous  man  of  business.  "  I  must 
stick  to  my  business,"  he  will  be  likely  to  say, 
"  or  my  means  of  sending  help  in  any  form  will 
fail."  By  all  means.  This  ought  he  to  do,  but 
not  to  leave  the  other  undone.  The  use  of  a  lit- 
tle portion  of  his  time  in  searching  out  the  cause 
of  the  poor,  will  pay  him  infinitely  better  than 
any  business  use  which  he  may  make  of  it.  If 
you  want  to  hallow  your  business,  don't  slave  at 
it,  and  don't  let  it  make  a  slave  of  you.  Leave 
it,  and  the  gain  it  might  bring,  some  hour  or  two. 


The  Family  Ministry,  267 

at  any  rate,  in  tlie  week ;  and  go,  see  for  your- 
Belves  how  poor  men  and  women  are  living,  how 
they  are  compelled  to  live  by  the  very  conditions 
which  make  it  possible  that  colossal  commercial 
fortunes  may  be  amassed.  See  for  yourselves 
how  women  will  fight  to  get  near  a  door  where 
slop-work  is  given  out,  which  will  yield  them 
some  sixpence  a-day  by  worse  than  a  slave's  toil. 
Do  not  be  content  to  hear ;  go  and  see,  and  put 
forth  a  hand  to  help  them  to  a  better  work.  At 
any  rate,  if  you  cannot  do  much  in  the  way  of 
helping,  bear  the  pain  of  seeing  it  and  touching 
it,  and  let  others  share  the  pain.  When  society 
fairly  takes  up  the  burden,  and  feels  its  weight, 
something  eifectual  will  be  done. 

And  the  real,  the  radical  mischief,  is  one  which 
the  childi-en  of  Christian  homes,  beyond  all  oth- 
ers, may  help  to  cure.  It  is  the  .wretched  home 
life  which  is  the  chief  parent  of  the  drunkenness, 
the  recklessness,  the  wastefulness,  the  apathy, 
which  make  such  havoc  of  the  means  and  the 
happiness  of  multitudes  of  our  labouring  poor. 
The  dirt,  the  closeness,  the  damp,  and  the  dark- 
ness, of  the  dens  which  hundreds  of  thousands  in 
our  great  cities  are  forced  to  couch  in  and  to  oc- 
cupy as  homes,  drive  the  men  forth  to  dissipation, 


268  The  Home  Life. 

and  break  down  tlie  women's  courage  and  strength. 
Clean;  sweet,  airy,  clieerful  liabitations,  must  be 
the  foundation  of  all  vital  improvement.  And 
the  housewifely  maiden,  trained  in  wise  thrift 
and  management,  who  shall  help  a  poor  woman 
to  keep  some  cleanly  order  in  her  close  lodging, 
in  spite  of  the  well-nigh  overwhelming  pressure 
of  her  lot — who  shall  teach  her  some  thi-ifty  ways, 
give  a  new  idea  of  the  management  of  the  chil- 
dren, and  see  that  she  has  a  clean  corner  by  a 
bright  hearth-fire  for  the  husband  when  he  comes 
home  from  his  tasks — is  rendering  society,  as  well 
as  her  poor  sister,*  a  noble  service,  and  is  helping 
effectually  towards  the  solution  of  the  most  per- 
plexed problem  of  our  times.  I  never  shall  for- 
get the  emphasis  with  which  a  husband  whose 
wife  had  been  taken  in  hand  by  a  wise,  kind 
woman  after  the  fashion  I  have  described,  and 
who  had  been  thus  weaned  from  the  gin-shop, 
once  exclaimed  to  me,  "  I  never  knew  what  it  was 
to  have  a  home  before." 

Eeform  the  homes,  and  the  poor  will  re- 
form themselves,  and  society  will  be  renewed  at 
the  spring.  Every  fresh  hand  put  forth  to  the 
w^ork,  eveiy  fresh  helper  who  will  give  personal 
ministry,  brings  us  nearer  to  the  time  when  the 


The  Family  Ministry.  269 

bitterness  of  poverty  will  cease  ont  of  tlie  land ; 
when  society  in  the  name  of  Christ,  and  by  the 
Spirit  of  Christ,  shall  rise  up  and  put  it  away  for 
ever.  It  can  be  done ;  it  will  be  done  one  day. 
If  every  master,  every  capitalist,  every  employer 
of  labour  were  a  Christ-like  man,  and  every  work- 
man industrious  and  upright,  where  were  the  mis- 
eries of  the  poor  ?  The  root  of  them  all  is  not  in 
things,  but  in  souls. 

III.  Believe  that  the  blessing  of  the  poor  and 
of  him  that  is  ready  to  perish,  is  the  noblest  rec- 
ord which  can  appear  for  you  on  high.  "  Then 
said  He  also  to  him  that  hade  Him^  When  thou 
makest  a  dinner  or  a  supper,  call  not  thy  friends , 
or  thy  brethren,  neither  thy  hinsmen,  nor  thy  rich 
neighbours  j  lest  tJiey  also  hid  thee  again,  and  a 
recompense  he  made  thee.  But  when  thou  makest 
a  feast,  call  the  poor,  the  maimed,  the  lame,  the 
hlind:  and  thou  shall  he  hlessed  j  for  they  cannot 
recompense  thee :  for  thou  shalt  he  recompensed  at 
the  resurrection  of  the  just  (Luke  xiv.  12-14). 

We  have  come  to  believe  that  such  words  are 
hyperbole.  That  they  simply  mean  in  general 
that  a  blessing  will  attend  on  charity.  But  as  for 
any  special  recompense  for  special  acts,  which  the 


270  The  Home  Life. 

text  seems  to  promise,  it  is  against  the  genius  of 
Christianity,  and  attributes  an  unworthy  minute- 
ness of  reckoning  to  God.  One  might  think  so, 
if  one  did  not  see  how  close  the  cause  of  the  poor 
is  to  the  heart  of  the  Great  Father.  If  it  be  to 
Christ's  brethren  that  you  offer  this  ministry,  if  it 
be  a  clearing  up  of  much  that  is  awfully  dark  and 
doubtful  about  the  ways  of  God,  we  can  compre- 
hend the  sentence  as  it  stands.  Call  these  poor 
ones  together  and  entertain  them,  you  are  enter- 
taining them  for  the  Lord ;  that  is  what  He  would 
do,  along  with  deeper  things,  to  give  them  a  mo- 
ment's honest  gladness.  He  does  it  through  you. 
He  confesses  Himself  your  debtor,  and  He  is  not 
one  to  forget  that  debt  in  the  great  day  of  eter- 
nity. I  use  very  strong  and  absolute  language 
here.  I  cannot  help  it.  It  is  not  I,  but  Scrip- 
ture :  "  He  that  hath  pity  on  the  poor  lendeth  to 
tJie  Lord,  and  that  which  he  hath  given  will  He 
pay  hisn  again P 

It  is  there,  plain  as  words  can  make  it.  Man 
may  make  God  his  debtor,  and  in  but  one  way. 
And  if  the  case  of  the  poor  be  a  great  sorrow  to 
the  Father's  heart,  a  great  difficulty  in  the  way 
of  His  government,  and  a  great  burden  to  heav- 
enly spirits,  one  can  understand  how  it  should  be 


The  Family  Mmistry.  271 

so.  He  who  helps  God  with  the  poor  helps  in- 
deed. Be  not  afraid  to  invest  largely  in  those 
bonds ;  heaven  seals  them  in  its  own  chancery,  and 
principal  and  interest  will  be  richly  repaid.  Of 
all  the  words  that  can  be  spoken  in  the  heavenly 
assembly  about  a  man  or  a  community,  there  are 
none  that  can  compare  with  these,  "  He  is  a  poor 
man's  friend."  '''He  hath  dispersed  abroad,  he 
hath  given  to  thejpoor,  his  righteousness  endureth 
for  every  About  what  other  works  that  a  man's 
hand  can  do,  is  such  a  sentence  wiitten  in  the 
word  of  God  ? 

I  know  that  I  may  be  thought  to  be  speaking 
injudiciously  here,  as  though  a  foundation  might 
be  laid  in  good  works  for  acceptance  with  God. 
But  the  Spirit  saw  what  use  could  be  made  of 
these  words  when  He  moved  His  servant  to  write 
them,  and  He  did  not  withhold  his  hand.  Are 
we  so  much  wiser  than  He  ?  I  am  little  afraid, 
to  tell  the  truth,  of  much  mischief  on  this  side. 
If  men  will  put  their  hands  to  the  work,  will  take 
the  burden  of  it  on  their  own  hearts,  it  will  empty 
them  of  self-conceit  and  self-righteousness,  or  noth- 
ing will.  No,  the  danger  is  not  in  this  directionl 
The  danger  is,  lest  in  these  days  men  should  de- 
spise these  Vnseen  rewards,  these  invisible  wreaths 


272  Tlie  Rome  Life, 

of  honour,  smiling  at  them  in  their  hearts  as 
dreams  or  superstitious  fancies,  things  meet  enpngh 
to  be  pursued  by  saints  and  women,  but  mere  fol- 
lies to  busy,  acute,  and  practical  men.  Thus  we 
men  are  prone  to  think  of  the  account  which  it  is 
said  heaven  keeps  with  the  friends  of  the  jpoor ! 

I  believe,  however,  in  most  substantial  repay- 
ments here.  IS^one  have  ever  been  beggared  by 
their  charities,  and  none  have  ever  been  left  help- 
less in  their  needs  who  were  known  as  poor  men's 
friends.  It  is  the  very  richest  inheritance  which 
a  man  can  lay  up  for  his  children,  the  reputation 
of  a  liberal  soul.  "  The  liberal  soul  shall  le  made 
fat^  and  hy  liberal  tKings  he  shall  standi  I  be- 
lieve that,  in  its  secret  soul,  the  world  holds  those 
in  highest  honour  who  have  most  helped  its  poor. 
If  ever  they  need,  it  delights  to  repay  the  debt. 
The  surest  of  all  banks  is  this — ^the  blessing  of 
poor  men.  God  keeps  the  deposits.  There  is  no 
measm-e  of  the  intei;est  of  that  exchequer;  for 
ten  talents  nobly  used,  ten  cities.  And  remem- 
ber the  day  will  come  when  the  last  cheque  has 
been  signed,  when  the  last  bill  has  been  drawn, 
when  the  last  coin  has  been  fingered.  Gold  has 
become  but  dirt  to  you,  it  wiU  glitter  for  you  no 
more  for   ever.      "£100,000  for  another  month 


The  Family  Ministinj.  273 

of  life,  doctor,"  cried  a  poor  millionnaire  in  his 
agony.  But  no ;  the  chink  of  coin  is  not  musical 
in  the  ears  of  the  Angel  of  death — the  doom  is 
pronounced,  the  judgment  must  proceed.  Naked 
came  you  forth  into  life,  naked  mwst  you  return 
to  death.  Let  poor  men's  blessings  cluster  round 
you,  then,  like  a  white  cloud  of  angels ;  let  fair 
robes  of  mercy  and  charity  be  your  divine  array. 
The  Lord  of  heaven,  the  poor  man's  defender  and 
keeper,  will ,  crown  your  head  with  a  diadem  of 
honour,  and  repay  the  deeds  of  Christ-like  charity 
which  you  have  done  for  Him  with  rich  interest 
through  eternity.  "  Come^  ye  hlessed  of  My  Fa- 
ther^ inherit  the  hingdom  prepared  for  you  from 
lefore  the  foundation  of  the  worldP 


12* 


X. 

THE    GOLDEN   AUTUMN. 

"  So  the  Lord  Messed  the  latter  end  of  Job  more  than  his 
deginning."— Job  xlii.  12. 

The  young  find  something  sad  in  the  tints  and 
skies  of  autumn ;  but  as  we  grow  older  we  love  it 
better.  There  is  that  which  is  not  out  of  tune 
with  the  colder  flow  of  our  own  life  currents,  in 
the  soft  gray  evening  of  the  year.  There  is  a 
certain  quiet  and  hush  in  nature,  when  the  stir  of 
her  spring  and  the  toil  of  her  summer  are  ended. 
A  sigh  of  peace  that  so  much  is  joyfully  though 
painfully  finished,  seems  to  prolong  itself  through 
autumn.  The  world  has  no  business  then  to 
trouble  it ;  its  noisy  concerns  are  ended  for  the 
year.  The  groaning  harvest  has  been  gathered, 
and  loads  the  portly  barns ;  the  fields  lie  bare  and 
quiet,  resting  under  the  smile  of  heaven,  and 
drinking  in  strength  for  new  motherly  cares  and 


The  Golden  Autumn.  275 

toils.  I  suppose  it  is  tMs  calm  undertone  of  prep- 
aration and  hope  wMch.  makes  autumn  far  from 
sad,  to  those  who  observe  the  reverse  as  well  as 
the  obverse  of  all  the  medals  of  nature  and  of 
life.  The  grp.y  sides,  the  falling  leaves,  the  whirl- 
ing storms,  the  damps  and  mists  of  autumn,  offer 
themselves  to  every  eye,  and  to  those  whose  eye 
is  still  the  main  inlet  of  impression  they  make  the 
"  fall "  the  dull,  sad  season  of  the  year.  But  na- 
ture, at  any  rate,  is  not  in  despair  about  it ;  and 
those  who  have  an  eye  for  the  quiet  touches  in 
nature's  countenance,  and  an  ear  for  the  under- 
tones of  her  song,  catch  somewhat  of  the  inspira- 
tion of  the  hope  which  gladdens  her  while  all  is 
dying,  and  enter  into  her  peace. 

In  truth  she  passes  with  something  like  tri- 
umphal pomp  into  her  wintry  tomb.  She  gathers 
her  bravest  mantle  grandly  around  her  as  she 
falls.  Just  as  the  pomp  of  the  sunset  clouds  robs 
nightfall  of  its  terror,  and  prophesies  over  the 
death  of  day  the  glorious  glow  that  will  soon  be 
tiuting  the- eastern  chambers,  whence  it  will  burst 
forth  as  a  bridegroom,  with  a  flush  of  triumph ; 
so  the  year  gathers  a  dress  of  living  splendour 
around  her,  as  her  step  grows  tremulous,  and  the 
snows  build  the  tomb  which  is  to  receive  her  to 


276  The  Home  Life. 

her  winter  sleep.  There  is  a  quiet,  a  grand,  even 
a  solemn  tone  about  the  hues  and  the-  expression 
of  autumn,  which  have  no  depression  in  them, 
because  no  death.  "  I  shall  not  die,  tut  live,  and 
declare  Thy  wondrous  worlcs,^^  nature  is  ever  cry- 
ing. "  The  king  is  dead ;  long  live  the  king ! " 
is  the  proclamation  which  thej  make  on  high  over 
the  graves  of  the  years. 

Life  has  its  hum  evefl  in  the  dead  hush  of  a 
midsumm«er  noon.  When  the  air  seems  so  still 
that  silence  grows  oppressive,  lay  your  ear  to  the 
ground,  and  listen  to  the  stir  of  the  myriad  in- 
sects that  are  keeping  their  summer  festival. 
You  will  not  marvel  that  simple  hearts,  in  the 
good  old  times,  believed  that  the  grasses  and  t£e 
flower-cups  were  haunted,  and  that  all  the  earth 
and  air  was  thronged  with  troops  of  joyous  invisi- 
ble sprites,  dancing  in  the  sunbeams,  swinging  in 
the  gossamer  chains,  hiding  in  the  flower  bells, 
and  making  the  summe;^  air  musical  with  the 
breath  of  their  merriment  and  song.  It  needs  a 
more  trained  and  observant  ear  to  catch  the  same 
undertone  through  the  sighing  winds  and  swirling 
leaves  of  autumn,  but  it  is  there;  life  has  but 
drawn  back  to  its  source  awhile,  and  there  it  is 
gathering  up  its  forces,. renewing  its  youth,  and 


The  Golden  Autumn.  2Y7 

preparing  for  the  outburst  of  the  spring.  It  is 
the  sense  that  there  is  no  death  in  nature,  that 
she  but  weaves  the  dress  of  Him  who  ever  liveth, 
and  has  commission  to  weave  on  while  He  liveth, 
which  robs  the  autumn  and  the  deepening  winter 
of  all  but  a  passing  breath  of  sadness,  and  makes 
their  twilight  hour  the  season  of  our  most  peace- 
ful and  happy  musings.  We  too,  if  we  have 
caught  the  divine  key-note,  ar6  content  to  rest 
with  them  when  the  main  toil  of  our  life-work  is 
over ;  to  rest  and  ripen,  and  lay  up  in  the  inner 
cells  the  sap  which  shall  make  the  flowers  of  our 
eternal  spmng.  Sometimes,  as  in  the  Indian  sum- 
mer of  Canada,  and  the  St.  Martin's  summer  of 
Switzerland,  autumn  has  a  glory  of  its  own  which 
contends  with  midsummer  for  the  crown.  ISTature 
is  never  more  splendid  than  in  the  calm  golden 
sunset  of  such  seasons  as  these ;  and  then,  too,  the 
vine,  noblest  of  all  fruits,  and  needing  noblest  cul- 
ture, yields  her  blushing  juices,  and  prolongs  far 
on  towards  the  winter  the  living  verdure  and 
beauty  of  the  year.  And  men  celebrate  "  Ad- 
vent" in  midwinter.  As  the  shadows  lengthen 
and  the  world  settles  to  its  winter's  sleep,  homes 
grow  glad ;  the  long  winter  evenings  are  the  sea- 
sons of  family  intercourse  and  the  higher  human 


278  The  Rome, Life, 

jojs.  IS'ot  without  significance  is  it  that  the 
great  Advent  festival  is  celebrated  when  nature 
lies  bare  and  cold.  There  is  in  man's  life  a  per- 
petual effort  to  realise  that  the  spring  of  his  hopes 
and  joys  lies  where  nature  cannot  touch  it ;  that 
it  is  fed  from  a  deeper  fountain,  which  flows  not 
with  her  floods,  and  ebbs  not  with  her  decline. 
The  advent  of  Him  who  is  our  life,  the  world's 
life,  we  chiefly  hail  when  all  lies  dead  and  cold 
around  us ;  sign  to  us  of  a  life  which  shall  outlast 
the  wreck  of  nature,  and  flourish  in  immortal 
youth  when  the  earth  has  settled  into  the  silence 
of  its  last  winter ;  though  earth,  too,  comes  forth, 
quickened  by  the  breath  which  quickens  man, 
into  the  brightness  of  an  eternal  spring.  When 
nature  has  spent  all  her  substance  and  is  beggared 
for  the  time,  man  opens  his  richer  treasures,  and 
brings  forth  his  most  precious  stores.  Life  never 
seems  so  rich,  so  joyous,  so  boundless  in  promise, 
in  hope,  as  when  the  home  circle  gathers  round 
the  Christmas  fire,  whose  light  'flashes  cheerily  on 
the  bleak  wintry  air ;  while  laughter,  song,  and 
softer  whispers,  seem  to  mock  the  moaning  wind, 
and  exult  joyously  over  decay  and  death. 

"   My  subject  here  is  the  autumn  of  life.     A 
golden  autumn,  we  all  may  make  it,  and  then  it 


The  Golden  Autumn.  279 

is  among  the  most  beautiful,  yea,  the  most  fruit- 
ful, of  all  the  seasons  of  life. 

I.  The  key  to  the  beauty  of  autumn  must  be 
sought  in  the  coming  spring. 

''At  even  time  there  shall  he  light^'^  is  the 
broad  grand  promise  which  stretches  like  a  heaven 
of  brightness  over  this  world  of  struggle,  decay, 
and  death.  Evening  is  lit  by  the  promise  of 
morning,  autumn  is  lit  by  the  promise  of  spring ; 
and  life's  quiet  eventide  is  lit  by  the  radiance  of 
the  eternal  heaven.  Strike  out  that  promise,  kill 
the  germ  that  lies  in  the  heart  of  decay,  the  hope 
that  nestles  and  stirs  under  the  ribs  of  death,  and 
the  world  is  a  huge  sepulchre — a  chamber  of  hor- 
rors, where  all  loathsome  things  are  gathered,  and 
souls  go  shuddering  by.  But  God  hath  writ  the 
promise  large,  so  that  every  eye  can  read  it — 
"  light  at  evening  timeP  To  every  brave  effort, 
to  every  high  hope,  to  every  strong  endm'ance,  to 
every  weary  day  of  toil,  there  is  light  at  evening ; 
because,  to  those  who  have  the  heart  to  look  for 
them,,  behind  the  gathering  gloom  there  is  God, 
heaven,  and  eternity.  ITothing  that  lives  need 
dread  the  darkness ;  to  the  living  it  is  but  the  veil 
of  a  brighter  day. 


280  The  Home  Life, 

And  here  is  the  inspiration  of  life  in  its  de- 
cline, an  inspiration  which  may  make  its  decline 
more  beautiful,  more  hopeful,  than  its  spring. 
At  the  root  of  all  that  can  ennoble  and  beautify 
the  wasting  decaying  powers,  lies  the  love  of  God 
and  the  hope  of  heaven.  Let  a  man  open  his 
heart  in  his  spring  to  that  fountain  of  renewing, 
let  him  plant  himself  early  by  the  watercourses 
of  God's  grace  and  love,  and  he  robs  the  destroyer 
of  all  his  power  and  all  his  terror.  The  decay 
which  touches  his  life  as  a  creature,. and  begins  to 
wither  and  waste  his  powers  the  moment  he  has 
touched  his  prime — the  eclipse  which  falls  over 
nature  as  the  ear  grows  dull,  and  the  eye  grows 
dim,  are  but  the  wearing  out  of  a  dress  which  has 
served  him  awhile ;  he  watches,  not  calmly  only, 
but  with  quiet  thankftdness,  as  it  grows  thin  and 
drops  piecemeal  into  dust,  longing  to  put  on  the. 
braver  dress  which  he  will  wear  in  the  presence- 
chamber  of  the  King  of  kings. 

Give  a  man  love  and  hope,  and  what  can  sad- 
den hiin  %  Love  for  the  present,  hope  for  the  fu- 
ture, a  spring  of  pure  fresh  joy  which  can  never 
fail  him,  a  glow  in  the  distance  hourly  brighten- 
ing, which,  as  he  nears  it,  flashes  out  into  glorious 
day.     If  men  nourished  their  souls  more  freely  at 


TJie  Golden  Autumn,  281 

these  foimtains,  and  breathed  more  deeply  these 
inspirations,  should  we  hear  so  much,  think  you, 
of  sour,  crabbed,  and  querulous  old  age?  What 
makes  men  sour  and  crabbed,  but  because  their 
roots  so  rarely  touch  the  everlasting  river  ?  "What 
makes  men  querulous,  but  because  they  cloud 
with  their  vanity  and  selfishness  the  flush  in  the 
skies  of  hope  %  I  have  known  one  of  splendid 
power  of  intellect  and  spirit,  full  of  the  energy 
that  can  lead  and  govern  men,  made  as  feeble  as 
an  infant,  as  dependent,  by  the  first  touch  of  ad 
vancing  death ;  and  he  spent  long  helpless  months, 
nay  years,  in  the  calmest  acquiescence,  the  se- 
renest  peace,  the  most  cheerful  contentment  with 
the  Higher  Will  to  which  his  life  had  been  one 
long  homage,  in  the  most  gentle,  nay,  playful 
self-adjustment  to  the  new,  and  to  the  onlookers, 
sad  conditions  of  the  strong  man's  long  decay. 
So  also  have  I  seen  a  smile  more  beautiful  than 
any  which  I  have  seen  in  living  faces,  playing 
around  a  dead  man's  lips. 

Feed  your  spring  and  summer  in  the  green 
pastures,  and  at  the*  still  waters  by  which  the 
Eternal  Shepherd  is  ever  striving  to  lead  you ; 
grapple  your  heart  of  hearts  to  the  Friend  whose 
fellowship,  whose  love,  shall  be  like  "the  springs 


282  The  Home  Life. 

and  the  palms  of  EKm  to  tlie  panting  and  faint- 
ing host,  and  tten  fear  not  but  that  the  antumn 
of  yonr  life,  however  storm-beaten  and  bare,  will 
have  a  golden  beauty  of  its  own,  which  will  leave 
no  regrets  for  summer,  and  which  will  have  closer 
kindred  with  the  radiant  glory  of  eternity. 

I  have  said  of  old  age,  dwelling  on  the  aspect 
which  it  so  constantly  and  so  sadly  wears  in  such 
a  world  as  this,  that  the  main  work  and  interest 
of  hfe  is  over  when  the  children  go  forth  and 
leave  the  parents  in  the  old  home  alone.  It  is 
true  enough  in  a  sense.  From  that  time  the  day 
begins  to  draw  downwards,  the  shadows  lengthen, 
and  there  is  a  chill  in  the  evening  air  that  flavours 
of  night.  It  is  much  as  moonhght  to  sunlight, 
this  age  of  life  to  which  the  grandchild  belongs 
rather  than  the  child.  The  age  when  the  stir  and 
struggle  of  the  battle  are  over,  when  the  business 
is  made,  and  the  position  is  won,  and  the  busy 
and  burdensome  part  of  it  passes  into  younger 
and  more  energetic  hands.  But  the  moonlight 
has  its  beauty  as  well  as  the  sunlight,  and  it  is 
richer  in  suggestions  of  the  spiritual  and  heavenly 
sphere.  And  God  is  very  tender  with  us.  I  am 
often  full  of  wonder  at  the  tender  fatherly  touches 
that  lie  thick  about  us  in  all  the  order  and  con- 


The  Golden  Aichomn.  283 

duct  of  our  lives.  How  few  homes  are  stript 
quite  bare;  how  few  aged  ones  are  left  quite 
alone !  How  constantly  love,  prompted  of  God, 
makes  some  tender  provision  for  their  quiet  even- 
ing and  darkening  night !  One  daughter  stays 
by'them  perhaps,  or  a  niece,  a  grandchild,  a  ward, 
who  finds  it  a  dear  and  sacred  duty  to  cheer  and 
smooth  their  down-hill  path,  and  who  makes  the 
otherwise  desolate  home  beautiful  and  blessed  by 
the  ministries  of  devoted  and  vigilant  love. 

And  if  all  the  young  ones  are  gone,  "  John 
Anderson,"  and  his  dear  old  dame,  are  not  the 
saddest  figures  upon  earth,  as  they  live  over  the 
past  again  by  their  "  ain  fireside,"  or  tread  to- 
gether the  shortening  path ;  and  when  one  goes 
first,  the  other  is  not  long  in  following — God  will 
not  keep  them  too  far  or  too  long  apart.  There 
is  a  cloud,  and  to  the  eye  of  sense  it  looks  a  dark 
and  a  dense  one,  overshadowing  the  age  of  decay 
and  decrepitude ;  but  we  can  catch  the  edge  of 
the  silver  lining  and  see  a  soft  fair  lustre  lighting 
the  path  to  the  very  borders  of  the  tomb.  There . 
it  brightens  with  an  awful  brightness : 

"  To  death  it  is  given, 
To  see  how  this  earth  lies  embosomed  in  heaven." 


284  The  Borne  Life. 

II.  To  prepare  for  a  golden  fruitful  alltnmii 
sliould  be  one  of  the  main  aims  of  a  man  in  his 
youth  and  his  prime. 

Not  that  our  chief  work  here  is  to  prepare  for 
times  and  seasons,  save  as  far  as  the  preparation 
for  one  time  is  the  preparation  for  all  time. 
There  is  no  schism  in  the  body  of  our  times. 
Man  is  one,  and  his  Hfe  is  one,  through  all  its 
stages ;  and  there  is  nothing  better  for  the  child, 
for  the  youth,  for  the  man,  for  the  old  man,  for 
the  dying  man,  than  "  to  do  justly^  to  love  mercy ^ 
and  to  walk  humbly  with  Ms  GodP  There  is 
nothing  which  can  prepare  a  man  for  the  peaceful 
and  fruitful  autumn  of  life,  which  will  not  equally 
be  his  preparation  for  the  winter  of  death,  and 
the  spring  of  resurrection.  But  the  thought  of 
the  years  of  decline  and  decay  which  are  before 
him,  "  ere  yet  the  silver  cord  he  loosed^  or  the  golden 
howl  he  hrdken^  or  the  mourners  go  about  the 
streets  ;  "  when,  if  he  have  no  springs  within  which 
are  fed  from  the  perennial  spring  on  high,  life  will 
be  but  a  long  and  terrible  wrestling  with  death, 
may  well  drive  in  on  a  man's  heart  and  conscience 
the  lesson,  "  Rememiber  now  thy  Creator  in  the 
days  of  thy  youth^'^  and  inspire  the  prayer,  "  Let 


The  Golden  Autumn.  285 

rq.e  live  the  life  of  the  righteous,  that  my  last  end 
may  be  like  theirs." 

There  are  few  men  who  do  not  think  anxiously 
about  some  provision  for  the  evening  of  life,  when 
the  powers  will  be  feebler  for  their  tasks,  and  the 
hope  of  rest  from  the  toils  of  business  will  grow 
daily  more  dear.  Men  will  save  and  pinch,  and 
starve  their  children's  minds  at  any  rate,  if  not 
their  bodies^  to  lay  up  gold  against  the  days  of  de- 
cline and  decay.  A  provision  for  old  age  is  one 
of  the  main  inspirations  of  the  years  of  business 
toils  and  cares.  "  There  is  another  thousand  safe 
against  the  time  when  I  can  work  no  longer,"  a 
man  says  to  himself,  and  finds  in  the  thought  a 
rich  compensation  for  many  privations  and  for 
wearing  toils.  But  wherefore  spend  ye  your 
money  for  that  which  is  not  hreadf  and  your 
labour  for  that  which  satisjleth  not  f  An  old  age 
wdth  plenty  to  feed  it,  and  nothing  to  occupy,  in- 
terest, and  cultivate  it,  is  surely  one  of  the  roost 
dismal  things  under  the  sun.  I  would  have  you 
prepare  a  real  and  rich  provision — ^bread  and  wine 
that  will  make  your  age  fairer  and  fresher  than 
your  youth,  which  will  make  your  home  a  nook 
to  which  young  children  love  to  gather,  as  bees 


286  The  Rome  Ufe. 

cluster  to  flowers,  to  sip  the  nectar  of  jour  wis- 
dom, and  nestle  in  the  embrace  of  your  love. 

I^or  do  I  mean  by  these  counsels  to  urge  you 
to  what  would  be  called  "  the  exclusive  cultiva- 
tion of  piety."    It  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose 
that  God  can  dispense  with  the  cultivation  of  any 
of  om*  powers.     The  man  who  systematically  lets 
mind  and  body  go  to  wreck,  while  he  cares  exclu- 
sively for  what  he  pleases  to  consider  "  the  inter- 
ests of  his  soul,"  is  in  a  fair  way  to  spend  a  joy- 
less and  loveless  old  age,  and  to  lie  at  length  in  a 
forgotten  tomb.     Piety  is  only  seen  in  its  true 
strength  and  beauty  in  the  harmony  of  all  the 
powers.     It  sits  as  queen,  but  it  is  cheerless  and 
joyless  without  its  court.     A  cleanly,  pure,  robust 
body ;  a  cultivated,  well-stored,  and  penetrating 
mind ;  a  large,  tender,  and  sympathetic  heart,  as 
well  as  a  pious  believing  spirit,  go  to  make  old 
age  honoured  and  blest. 

And  I  would  have  young  men  remember,  in 
view  of  the  infirmities  and  sorrows  of  age,  that  a 
wasteful  and  wanton  youth,  makes  the  chief  of 
the  blots  which  disfigure,  and  the  pains  which 
torment  it.  If  you  want  years  of  miserable  de- 
cay, begin  early  to  "  hve  fast."  It  is  a  sure  re- 
ceipt.    It  is  sin,  as  I  have  said,  which  lends  all 


TTie  Golden  Autumn.  287 

that  is  terrible  to  decay  and  death.  But  for  the 
work  of  sin  in  ns,  the  work  of  time  upon  ns  would 
be  benign  and  beautiful  as  on  the  *^  green  bay- 
tree,"  whose  leaves  wither  and  drop  only  when 
they  are  thrust  out  by  the  buds  of  spring.  And 
excess  in  youth,  excess  of  all  sorts,  leaves  its  bit- 
ter and  inevitable  legacy,  in  a  fretful,  Tfeary, 
hateful  old  age.  When  I  speak  of  excess,  I  am 
not  simply  thinking  of  the  coarser  forms ;  girls  in 
their  vanities,  frivolities,  and  dissipations,  may  be 
as  wasteful  of  the  vital  energy  as  men  in  their 
gambling  dens  and  stews.  You  reckon  so  much 
saved  each  day  to  make  your  old  age  "  warm,"  as 
the  saying  goes.  I  wish  you  would  open  a  larger 
ledger,  and  reckon  that  the  manful  conquest  of  a 
temptation  to  vicious  indulgence,  the  curtailment 
of  a  wasteful  amusement  or  pursuit,  the  effort  to 
expand  the  physical  powers  with  which  God  has 
endowed  you,  that  you  may  keep  a  sound  body 
to  be  the  tabernacle  of  a  sound  mind,  itself  to  be 
cultivated  by  other  discipline,  is  a  far  nobler  and 
a  far  more  useful  investment,  and  one  that  will 
pay  better  in  the  common  stuff  of  comfort  and 
happiness,  than  untold  stores  of  gold.  Paralysis 
is  little  the  better  for  gilding.  A  bleared  eye  and 
a  shaky  hand  get  but  little  pleasure  out  of  rolls 


288  The  Home  Life, 

of  crisp  bank-notes.  And  youth  is  tlie  time  to 
practise  the  lesson.  "  Oh,  could  I  but  have  my 
youth  over  again !  "  how  many  palsied  reprobates 
are  crying.  For  remember,  young  friends,  a  con- 
stitution once  impaired,  health  once  broken,  vital 
strength  once  squandered,  no  agony  of  effort,  or 
even»prayer,  can  repair  or  restore. 

I  would  counsel  all  men  and  women,  and  more 
especially  those  of  constant  and  close  occupation, 
during  their  days  of  enterprise  and  energy,  when 
the  whole  time  and  strength  seems  to  be  impe- 
riously demanded  for  the  day's  work,  to  set  apart 
some  small  fragment  of  them  rigidly,  as  conse- 
crated to  yet  higher  use.  I  say  yet  higher  use. 
For  I  regard  the  honourable  toils  of  business,  or 
of  the  home  management,  as  a  very  high  and 
worthy  use  of  the  powers.  I  would  have  men 
throw  their  energy  into  commerce,  as  into  a  work 
which  is  worthy  of  them;  and  I  would  have 
women  master  the  details  of  home  economy  with 
a  thoroughness  which  would  leave  their  servants 
but  little  independent  scope.  Figures,  stuffs,  bills 
— it  may  seem  poor  in  detail,  but  it  is  not  a  poor 
thing  to  help  to  carry  on,  however  humbly,  the 
great  commerce  of  life.  By  these  things  the 
world  lives  and  grows,  and  offers  an  ever-widen- 


The  Golden  Autumn.  289 

ing  seed-field  to  him  wlio  has  the  seed  of  the  di- 
vine culture  to  cast  into  it,  fresh  from  the  Great 
Sower's  hand. 

But  much  of  the  cheerfulness  and  happiness 
of  life's  autumn,  depend  on  the  measure  in  which 
a  man  has  concerned  himself  with  something 
other  than  his  business,  with  the  culture  of  the 
intellect,  the  enlargement  of  the  higher  faculties 
of  the  being,  and  their  education  for  a  superior 
sphere.  How  many  men  when  they  relax  the 
strain  of  attention  to  business,  and  women  when 
the  children  are  married,  and  the  main  parfof 
their  home  cares  is  off  their  hands,  begin  at  once 
to  stagnate — ^happy  if  they  do  not  become  like 
sluggish  waters,  foul  with  weeds  and  slime.  Men 
who  will  not  read  when  they  are  young,  cannot 
read  when  they  are  old.  They  have  no  interest 
in  it,  and  no  heart  for  it.  Men  who  will  not  go 
forth  into  nature,  and  train  themselves  to  search 
into  her  wonders,  while  their  minds  and  senses 
are  keen,  when  they  grow  old  sit  moping  over 
their  fires,  or  go  pottering  about  their  gardens, 
killing  the  most  precious  thing  in  the  universe  to 
the  wise  man — time,  time  to  think,  time  to  ac- 
quire, time  to  love,  time  to  bless  mankind. 

But  there  are  men  of  business,  who  are  not 
13 


290  The  Home  Life. 

indisposed  to  cultivate  tlieir  minds,  and  lay  up 
some  priceless  stores  of  tliouglits  and  habits  to 
cheer  the  evening  of  their  days,  who  yet  complain 
that  they  have  not  a  moment  for  study  or  even 
for  a  look  at  nature;  business  presses  morning, 
noon,  and  night,  and  must  be  done.  Well,  the 
root  of  it  all  is  "  hasting  to  be  rich,"  to  put  it  in 
plain  terms.  You  cannot  get  rich  while  you  are 
young,  and  give  at  the  same  time  some  fair  culti- 
vation to  your  nobler  powers.  Be  absorbe4,  body, 
soul,  and  spirit,  in  business,  and  life  becomes  a 
business ;  and  when  you  are  out  of  business,  you 
have  no  business  at  all  in  life. 

I  would  have  every  man  of  close  occupation 
make  it  a  sacred  duty  to  keep  up  a  li\dng  knowl- 
edge of,  and  interest  in,  some  pursuit,  science, 
art,  or  craft,  outside  the  circle  of  his  daily  task. 
Thereby  he  will  keep  his  mental  faculties  in  fair 
play  upon  their  appointed  objects,  and  lay  up  for 
himself  a  pursuit  and  an  education,  which  will 
occupy  nobly  and  happily  the  autumn  of  life. 
What  men  want  is  something  to  carry  on  their 
education  till  they  die — something  which  will 
continually  draw  them  out  to  fresh  observation, 
fi-esh  reflection,  fresh  acquisition,  with  ever  stronger 
and  riper  power.     And  such  objects  must  be  set 


The  Golden  Autumn.  291 

before  the  mind's  eye  in  youth,  they  must  give 
their  tincture  to  the  blood  when  it  is  warm  and 
vivid.  ^N'o  middle-aged  man  can  hope  to  break 
up  a  new  seedfield  of  thought  with  any  chance 
of  a  high  success.  Clip  a  bit  from  your  daily 
earnings  rather  than  from  your  daily  study.  Sur- 
round yourselves  with  objects  of  interest  and 
beauty,  the  mere  living  with  which  will  be  a  par- 
tial education,  preparing  you  to  search  out  their 
more  hidden  meanings,  when  the  toil  of  your 
busiest  years  is  over,  and  you  can  spare  time  and 
thought  for  the  things  which  your  soul  has  taught 
itself  to  delight  in  and  to  love. 

How  many  of  your  friends  seem  to  be  en- 
larging, ripening,  and  rising  heavenward  with 
the  years?  Cold,  hard,  selfish,  loveless  old  age 
abounds ;  mainly  because  men  sell  so  much  of  the 
pith  and  the  fire  of  their  youth  for  gold,  and  are 
just  like  a  worked-out  mine  of  force,  when  the 
life  of  earth  should  be  ripening  for  heaven.  The 
play  and  even  the  strain  of  the  faculties — ^the 
various  faculties  of  body,  mind,  and  spirit,  in  wise 
proportions  and  alternations — ^is  the  true  human 
joy.  Plenty  to  think  of,  plenty  to  observe,  plenty 
to  pursue,  plenty  to  delight  in,  plenty  to  help, 
plenty  to  love — these  make  the  gladness  and  the 


292  The  Home  Life. 

riclies  of  tlie  being.  And  men  and  women  who 
deliberately  shut  themselves  up  to  a  narrow  pas- 
ture, and  care  just  for  one  thing  in  life,  the  busir 
ness  or  the  household  toils,  spend  a  joyless  spring, 
a  sunless  summer,  quite  miss  their  autumn,  and 
settle  into  the  drearihood  of  winter  in  their  prime. 
It  is  said  of  some  nations  that  they  know  no  child- 
hood, the  children  become  little  men  and  women 
as  soon  as  they  can  flirt  and  strut.  Equally  sad 
is  it  for  a  people  to  have  no  benign  and  rich  old 
age.  And  it  is  just  the  goodness  and  manifold- 
ness  of  the  objects  with  which  a  man  occupies 
himself  in  his  prime,  the  objects  of  his  thought, 
pursuit,  and  love  through  his  spring  and  summer, 
which  make  his  autumn  golden,  and  shield  its 
fruits  from  the  blights  of  winter,  till  they  are 
gathered  into  the  gamers  on  high. 

III.  The  occupations  and  cares  of  a  golden 
autumn  have  a  larger  scope  and  richer  interest, 
though  they  may  be  inspired  by  a  feebler  energy, 
than  those  of  the  youth  and  the  prime.     For — 

1.  The  head  ought  to  grow  wiser  as  the  hands 
grow  feebler  and  the  pulse  slower.  The  man 
whose  busy  life  is  well-nigh  done,  has  a  noble 
sphere  in  counselling  the  workers,  and  tenipering 


The  Golden  Autumn,  293 

in  due  measures  the  fervour  of  youth  with  the 
calmness,  the  certainty,  and  the  constancy  of  age. 
In  due  measures,  I  say,  and  here  is  where  the  old 
seem  so  constantly  to  fail,  and  to  throw  them- 
selves out  of  gear  with  the  new  times.  They 
fight  against  the  current  instead  of  striking  in 
with  it,  and  lose  all  power  of  guiding  it,  in  the 
hopeless,  desperate  endeavour  to  stem  it  or  to 
turn  it  aside.  For  stemmed  it  will  not  be,  aside 
it  will  not  go.  Each  age  has  its  new  key-note. 
There  are  but  few  of  the  aged  who  seem  able  to 
catch  the  tune  of  the  new  time,  and  to  strike  in 
with  it.  The  ways,  the  habits,  the  needs,  the 
aims,  the  hopes,  of  the  young  generation  jar  on 
them.  It  sounds  like  a  new  gospel,  and  anath- 
ema is  ready  on  their  lips.  And  the  young  de- 
light to  parade  its  newness.  They  take  pride  in 
the  new  time  and  in  its  promise,  and  flout  the 
wisdom  of  the  past.  Yet  the  new  time  is  much 
more  like  the  old  time,  young  friends,  than  you 
are  dreaming ;  the  thoughts  that  stir  your  blood, 
stirred  your  fathers'  before  you  were  born.  But 
if  the  old  men,  instead  of  looking  lovingly  upon 
the  new  ideas  and  methods  which  the  young  en- 
ergy of  the  age  invents  or  announces,  and  the 
ardent  hope  with  which  it  starts  on  its  career,  will 


294  The  Home  Life. 

frown,  and  carp,  and  sneer,  will  obstruct  enter- 
prises and  prophecy  miscarriages,  will  seek  to 
lower  tlie  tone  of  effort,  and  to  cliill  the  ardonr 
of  hope,  they  will  be  diiven  to  the  wall  inevita- 
bly; the  tides  may  be  stopped  as  easily  as  the 
progress  of  the  times.  I  would  that  old  men 
could  believe  more  heartily  in  God  as  the  leader 
of  the  progress,  and  be  sure  that  the  new  age, 
equally  with  the  old,  is  under  His  guiding  hand. 
If  they  find  it  hard  to  trust  it,  at  least  let  them 
trust  the  God  who  leads  it,  and  show  a  genial  joy 
in  its  progress,  for  it  does  but  continue  the  prog- 
ress which  in  their  times  they  led. 

Above  all,  I  would  have  the  young  impetuous 
spirits  believe  that  then-  fathers  have  pored  over 
the  same  problems  which  puzzle  them,  and  have 
tried  in  their  way  the  solutions  of  which  the  new 
time  makes  its  boasts.  They  have  made  no  great 
discovery,  however  brilliant  may  be  their  specula- 
tions ;  they  simply  stand  on  the  vantage  ground 
of  their  fathers'  lives,  and  sweep  the  horizon  of 
a  somewhat  wider  world.  I  would  have  them 
soften,  in  their  intercourse  with  the  elders,  the 
contrasts  which  they  are  prone  to  exaggerate,  and 
bring  forth  the  common  truth  which  underlies  the 
conflicting  statements,  delighting  to  recognise  the 


The  Golden  Autumn.  295 

bond  wliicli  makes  tlie  first  and  tlie  last  genera- 
tions one.  I  would  have  them  honour  the  battle- 
cries  which  the  fathers  bore  through  many  a  hard- 
fought  field  of  intellectual  and  spiritual  conflict, 
and  take  their  chief  joy  and  pride  in  that  which 
unites  them  with  the  past.  We  should  have  less 
schism  then  in  homes  and  generations,  and  the  old 
would  be  less  disposed  to  moan  that  God  keeps 
them  lingering  on  ground  which  they  seem  but 
to  cumber,  and  that  the  world  would  get  on  bet- 
ter, and  would  escape  many  sorrows  and  troubles, 
if  they  were  fairly  out  of  the  way. 

But  the  true  old  man's  wisdom  needs  no  such 
pliances  and  concessions.  It  will  blend  kindly 
with  the  young  enthusiasm;  it  will  guide  and 
temper  it ;  it  will  lend  it  method  and  firmness, 
and  show  to  it  the  way  to  realise  its  hope.  The 
old  man's  chair  ought  to  be  the  oracle  to  the 
young  ones  of  the  household,  the  company,  the 
state.  They  should  be  drawn  to  his  wisdom  as 
stars  to  their  sun.  The  gray-headed  patriarch,  if 
he  understands  the  secret  of  his  power,  if  he 
grows  while  he  lives,  will  make  his  word  a  more 
powerful,  and  his  work  a  more  precious  thing, 
than  when  he  could  throw  into  them  all  the  fire 
and  energy  of  his  youth.     A  wise  and  genial  old 


296  TU  Borne  Life. 

man  or  woman  is  one  of  the  noblest  of  human 
figures,  if  not  the  very  noblest.  There  is  some- 
thing in  the  true  relation  of  the  patriarch  to  the 
younger  race  growing  up  under  his  shadow,  at 
which  we  have  just  hinted,  which  is  singularly 
beautiful.  But  for  selfishness — selfish  old  men, 
selfish  young  men — we  should  realise  it  as  a  prin- 
ciple of  divine  order  in  all  our  homes  and  states. 
The  quiet  withdrawing  from  the  scenes  of  hot 
and  contentious  activity  which  occupy  the  prime 
of  every  life,  should  be  but  the  beginning  of  a 
new  and  calmer,  but  a  more  constant,  benign,  and 
noble  energy ;  of  which  the  home  circle,  the  busi- 
ness, the  parish,  the  state,  according  to  the  sphere 
and  the  habit  of  the  life,  should  show  blessed  and 
abundant  fruits.  And  this  leads  us  to  a  second 
point. 

2.  One  of  the  main  concerns  of  a  life  in  its 
golden  autumn  is  charity. 

I  use  the  word  in  its  larger  sense.  I  would 
include  in  it  all  that  disciplined,  patient,  unselfish 
energy  can  do  to  serve  mankind,  and  most  espe- 
cially the  afiflicted  of  this  world  and  its  poor.  To 
wise,  good  men,  in  their  golden  autumn,  society 
looks  to  be  dts  almoners,  its  guardians,  its  over- 
seers.    Rising  above  the  nan'ow  interests  of  a 


The  Golden  Autumn.  297 

business  wliich  has  gain  for  its  inspiration,  thej 
find  a  wider,  nobler  field  before  tliem  in  the  ser- 
vice of  their  fellow-men.  "  The  cause  that  we 
know  not,"  like  Job,  thej  can  "  search  out  for 
us."  "  They  can  be  "  eyes  to  the  blind,  and  feet  to 
the  lame ;  "  they  can  be  "  fathers  to  the  poor ; " 
they  can  "  break  for  us  the  jaws  of  the  wicked, 
and  pluck  the  spoil  out  of  their  teeth."  The  wis- 
dom, the  patience,  the  compassion  which  they 
have  gained  in  the  battle,  they  can  exercise  for  us 
in  a  nobler  field.  They  can  be  the  elders  of  our 
churches,  the  guardians  of  our  poor,  the  visitors 
of  our  prisoners  and  captives,  the  nurses  of  our 
sick,  the  teachers  of  our  ignorant,  the  guides  of 
our  public  and  private  ministries  of  mercy.  Their 
old  age  may  be  more  than  beautiful ;  the  golden 
autumn  may  glow  into  glory.  There  have  been 
men  and  women  in  their  green  old  age,  with  no 
transcendent  powers,  who  have  made  themselves 
names  as  angels  of  mercy,  which  shall  ring  through 
the  world  while  the  world  endures. 

There  is  thus  a  large  sphere  of  duty,  and  that 
the  highest,  which  they  may  make  all  their  own ; 
in  which  no  young,  brilliant  Elihu  can  compete 
with  them.  And  they  may  so  occupy  it  that, 
when  the  tottering  limbs  fail  at  last,  and  refuse  to 
13* 


298  The  Home  L'ife. 

bear  the  still  eager  spirit  through  its  wonted 
rounds,  it  shall  bring  poor  men's  blessings  round 
their  dying  pillow,  thick  as  the  troop  of  white- 
winged  angels,  who  wait  to  bear  the  worn-out  sol- 
dier of  duty  from  his  field  of  battle  to  his  glorious 
rest.  I  think  that  in  God's  scheme  of  our  lives, 
which  our  selfishness  is  ever  marring,  but  of 
which  in  the  lives  of  our  greatest  and  purest  we 
have  gleams,  this  season  of  higher  service  is  inter- 
posed with  benign  beauty  between  the  busy  and 
too  selfish  cares  of  our  maturity,  and  the  yet 
higher  service  in  God's  kingdom  to  which  it  is  to 
exalt  us  beyond. 

3.  The  golden  autumn  of  life  ought  to  be  a 
quiet  but  profoundly  impressive  homily  upon 
hope. 

Quiet,  I  say.  The  evening  does  not  babble 
about  the  morrow.  The  autumn  does  not  babble 
about  the  spring.  "  In  qidetness  and  confidence 
shall  he  your  strength''''  is  the  patriarch's  text. 
Quiet  trust,  quiet  joy,  quiet  hope.  We  are  almost 
losing  our  knowledge  of  the  quiet  virtues.  Old 
age,  ripe  and  genial,  with  a  glow  still  on  it,  must 
keep  them  before  our  sight.  I  would  not  have 
the  patriarchs  always  talking  about  heaven. 
"  Pious  talk,"  from  lips  or  from  books,  has  done 


The  Golden  Autumn.  299 

its  utmost  to  mar  the  witness  of  pious  life.  Lit- 
tle talk  there  may  be,  though,  words  on  heaven 
fall  sweetly  from  aged  lips,  but  I  would  have  old 
men  look  as  if  they  were  familiar  with  its  path- 
ways, and  not  without  some  rich  foretaste  of  its 

joys. 

The  fixed  expression  of  their  gentle  decline 
should  be  hope.  Men  catch  it  readily  enough, 
and  feel  the  inspiration  of  it,  when  it  is  there.  I 
am  not  sure  that  it  was  not  the  unconscious  con- 
tagion of  the  strange  joy  and  hope  with  which 
the  apostolic  Church  was  animated,  which  com- 
menced the  revival  that  swept  with  its  quicken- 
ing breath  through  all  the  higher  philosophy  and 
literature  of  the  pagan  world.  Hope  is  a  gospel 
which  life  really  preaches.  And  children  even 
can  see  when  decay  and  death  are  stripped  of 
their  terrors,  and  when  the  beloved  and  honoured 
elders  in  their  home,  just 

"  Long  for  evening  to  undress, 
That  they  may  rest  with  God." 

Nothing,  I  am  sure,  strikes  such  a  pure,  high 
key-note  in  a  home,  as  an  old  age  which  has  a 
genial  smile  for  earth,  and  a  home-longing  look 
to  heaven.     And  forms   of  dear   and  honoured 


300  TTie  Home  Life. 

patriarclis  come  up  into  my  memory  as  I  write 
these  words,  grand  and  good  old  men,  to  live  un- 
der the  shadow  of  whose  liyes  was  a  benediction, 
and  who  have  left  households  rich  in  reverence, 
rich  in  concord,  rich  in  hope.  God  send  to  us  old 
age  so  full  of  tender,  childlike  interest  in  all 
human  things,  that  infants  may  prattle  their  tales 
into  its  ear ;  so  full  of  ripe  wisdom  and  celestial 
love,  that  angels  might  find  in  it  fit  audience  for 
the  histories  and  the  hymns  of  heaven !  The 
beautiful  link  of  the  two  worlds !  Strong,  brave 
father  1  Wise,  true  mother !  The  frame  is  bowed 
a  little,  and  the  step  grows  tremulous.  There  are 
wrinkles  on  the  broad,  calm  brow,  and  the  clear 
pallor  of  healthy  age  tones- the  once  ruddy  cheek. 
The  enemy  has  his  touch  on-  you,  but  a  smile 
steals  up  as  you  recognise  the  form  which  brings 
your  summons  to  your  home,  your  rest.  The  last 
legacy,  I  think,  which  you  will  leave  to  your  chil- 
dren, and  your  children's  children,  when  you  part 
from  them,  will  be  the  smile  of  immortal  life, 
playing  around  the  stifiening  lips  of  death. 


XI. 
THE    WHOLE    FAMILY. 

"  The  whole  family. ''"' — Ern.  iii.  15. 

To  comprehend  this  wholeness  we  must  take 
in  the  two  worlds.  Life  completes  itself  through 
death.  By  death  only  the  two  bands  whom  death 
had  severed  become  one.  And  this  is  the  Chris- 
tian victory  over  death.  The  terror  compelled  to 
become  the  minister ;  the  demon  transformed  into 
the  angel;  the  great  destroyer  changed  into  the 
great  reconciler,  and  constrained  to  complete  with 
eternal  perfectness  that  unity  which,  but  for 
Christ,  he  had  for  ever  destroyed. 

I  cling  to  the  thought  of  "  over-abounding 
grace  "  which  fills  so  large  a  space  in  the  writings 
of  St.  Paul.  Words  have  to  stretch  themselves 
to  their  utmost  tension,  to  express  what  the  apos- 
tle realised  when  he  meditated  on  the  divine  mys- 
tery, "  The  love  of  God  in  Christ.,  which  passeth 


•    302  The  Home  Life. 

hnowledge.'^'^  "  Moreover,  the  law  entered  that  the 
offence  might  abound ;  hut  where  sin  abounded, 
grace  did  much  more  abound  ^  that  as  sin  hath 
reigned  unto  death,  even  so  might  grace  reign, 
through  righteousness,  unto  eternal  life,  by 
Jesus  Christ  our  LordP  The  contrast  between 
"  abounded"  and  "  mucli  more  abounded,"  in  our 
translation,  verj  poorly  expresses  the  force  of  the 
contrast  in  the  original  expression  of  St.  Paul. 
Kot  a  superior  but  a  superlative  mastery  is  ex- 
pressed by  his  impetuous  words.  Grace  shall  not 
rebuild  ruins  only,  but  recreate  with  superlative 
■^ralidem*  and  splendour  what  sin  had  destroyed; 
and  foremost  among  these  transformations  is  this 
transformation  of  death.  Death  through  Christ 
completes  the  edifice  of  life,  and  crowns  it.  The 
touch  which,  through  the  legacy  which  Adam  left 
us,  rifles  homes  and  hearts  of  their  treasures,  in 
Christ  becomes  their  consecration;  the  dew  of 
death  is  transmuted  into  the  chrism  of  eternal 

joy. 

"  O  death,  I  will  be  thy  plagues !  O  grave,  I 
will  be  thy  destruction !  "  cried  the  prophet  in  the 
Divine  name,  under  a  dispensation  which  we  too 
readily  believe  saw  through  the  veil  but  dimly, 
and  had  but  feeble  grasp  of  the  realities  of  "  life 


The   Whole  Family,  303 

and  immortality."  It  is  just  this  triumphant 
sense  of  power  'over  the  dark  element  in  life — 
over  all  that  belongs  to  the  region  of  the  shadow 
of  death — which  the  gospel  of  life  substantiates. 
Such  passages  as  these  in  the  Old  Testament 
scripture^ — and  they  are  many — are  the  first  notes 
of  the  exulting  strain  which  runs  through  the 
l!Tew,  and  finds  fullest  expression  in  the  rapturous 
language  of  St.  Paul.  Words  cannot  express  the 
sense  of  exuberant  power  which  filled  him,  when 
he  reahsed  what  his  life  as  a  redeem^ed  man  in 
Christ  implied  and  prophesied.  All  the  sadness 
of  life,  all  the  bitterness  of  death,  absolutely  van- 
ished from  his  field  of  vision.  "Was  tribulation 
his  experiencej  "  hoiids^  affl/ictions,  persecutions,^'' 
a  glorious  joy  possessed  him,  and  bore  him  through 
them  triumphantly.  Did  death  affront  him,  and 
there  was  no  moment  w^hen  it  was  far  away,  he 
but  lifted  his  voice  in  a  more  joyous  burst  of 
thanksgiving,  that  death  was  for  ever  "  swallowed 
up  in  mctoryP 

What  timid  reading  do  we  give  to  the  words, 
"  If  while  we  were  enemies  we  were  reconciled  to 
God  hy  the  death  of  His  Son,  much  more,  heing 
reconciled,  we  shall  he  saved  hy  His  life !  "  If 
the  death  destroyed  death  for  us,  and  wrought  our 


304  The  Home  Life. 

great  deliverance,  how  mucli  more  shall  the  life 
enrich  and  glorify  life !  Have  faith,  and  exnlt  in 
the  boundless  possibilities  of  the  future.  "  Said 
I  not  unto  thee  that  if  thou  loouldest  lelieve,  {hou 
shoiddest  see  the  glory  of  God  f  "  Does  any  one 
of  us  imagine,  even  faintly,  what  that  may  mean  ? 
Ib  it  a  brother  restored  on  earth  to  a  dear  embrace 
— the  light  shining  again  in  the  home,  with  a 
tinge  in  it  of  celestial  brightness,  as  the  risen 
man,  recovered  from  death,  rejoined  the  familiar 
company  ?  Or  is  it  the  brothers  gathering  in  the 
eternal  home,  purged  of  all  stain,  and  pure  from 
every  taint  and  flaw,  bathed  in  the  lustre  of  the 
supernal  sunlight,  one  in  love,  in  life,  for  ever- 
more? A  strange  and  awful  joy,  surely,  shall 
possess  us,  when  we  behold  once  more  the  parted, 
and  miss  for  ever  the  mortal  blemish,  the  flaws, 
the  stains,  the  weaknesses  of  sin,  and  see  the 
noble  features  which  we  loved  and  cherished 
transfigured,  bright  with  an  immortal  beauty,  and 
glowing  with  an  immortal  life.  We  shall  have  a 
vision  then  of  what  "  saved  ly  His  life "  may 
mean.  Till  then,  ^' Lord,  we  helieve ;  hut  help 
Thou  o^ir  ujibelief'' 

Let  me  ask  you  to  consider  with  me — 


The   Whole  Family.  305 

I.  The  inevitable  rupture  of  tlie  unity  of  the 
home. 

We  say  not,  it  may  he  broken:  it  must  be 
broken.  The  hour,  comes  inevitably  when  you 
shall  watch  the  death-shadow  deepening  on  the 
face  that  you  most  dearly  love.  The  last  word 
will  be  spoken,  the  last  look  of  love  will  gleam 
forth,  and  then  you  question  the  still  rosy  lips, 
but  they  are  for  ever  silent;  you  search  the 
depths  of  the  beloved  eyes,  but  a  film  has  gath- 
ered over  them,  the  depths  have  vanished,  only  a 
cold  dull  mask  is  there.  And  a  great  agony  seizes 
the  soul  that  is  widowed ;  a  great  wail,  a  great 
appeal,  it  may  be  a  great  protest,  goes  up  from  an 
overstrained  heart  to  God.  This  lies  in  the  fu- 
ture of  every  home,  blessed  be  God.  We  say 
blessed  be  God  m  faith  here,  we  shall  repeat  it  in 
open  vision  there,  when  death  has  transplanted 
the  whole  family  to  the  home  which  the  Lord  has 
founded  and  adorned  for  it  on  high.  But  a  stern, 
sad  experience  lies  between  all  of  us  and  that 
consummation ;  an  experience  which  the  steadfast 
vision  of  the  consummation  alone  can  transmute 
into  solemn  and  holy  joy. 

And  Death,  who  bursts  the  bond  and  rifles  the 
treasures  of  our  homes,  wears  to  the  eye  of  sense 


306  The  Home  Life. 

no  angelic  aspect.  In  this  sin-liaunted  sphere  lie 
still  wears  liis  dress  of  terrors.  He  is  one  of  God's 
chief  preachers  of  righteousness,  and  bears^  form 
which  drives  his  lessons  home.  Were  death  but 
translation,  we  conld  hail  his  advent.  Enoch, 
Elijah,  found  death,  the  one  a  gentle,  the  other  a 
triumphant  passage,  to  the  joys  and  the  splen- 
dours of  eternity.  But  Adam  left  not  transla- 
tion as  his  legacy  to  his  children.  "  Sin  entered 
into  the  world,  and  death  hy  sin,^^  and  death, 
wedded  to  sin,  brought  a  terror  of  dying  into  the 
human  heart.  Part  of  death,  perhaps  the  saddest 
part,  is  the  inevitable  decay ;  the  long,  slow,  sad 
decline,  sad  but  for  the  light  which  falls  on  it 
from  a  higher  sphere.  ''As  our  outer  man  de- 
cayeth,  our  inner  man  is  renewed  day  ty  dayP 
"  For  we  Tcnow,  that,  if  our  earthly  house  of  this 
tabernacle  were  dissolved,  we  have  a  building  of 
God,  a  house  not  made  with  hands,  eternal  in  the 
heavens.  For  in  this  we  groan,  earnestly  desiring 
to  he  clothed  upon  with  our  house  which  is  from 
heaven :  if  so  be  that  being  clothed,  we  shall  not 
be  found  nahed.  For  we  that  are  in  this  taberna- 
cle do  groan,  being  burdened :  not  for  that  we 
would  be  unclothed,  but  clothed  upon,  that  mortal- 
ity might  be  swallowed  up  of  life  "  (2  Cor.  v.  1-4). 


The   Whole  Family.  307 

God  will  not  have  us  forget  in  tlii&  world  the  evil 
tree,  of  which  sin  is  the  bitter  fruit.  All  the 
dread  apparatus  of  death,  is  God's  lesson  to  the 
living  about  sin.  There  is  no  attempt  on  the  part 
of  heaven  to  soften  or  sweeten  the  homilj.  Chris- 
tianity brought  to  us  no  mitigation  of  the  physi- 
cal pains  and  fears  of  dying.  Its  whole  work  is 
in  the  spirit  which  endures  them,  and  sees  in  them 
the  birth-pangs  of  the  life  eternal.  And  this  is 
the  solace,  yea,  the  more  than  solace,  of  bereave- 
ment  in  a  Christian  home :  the  whole  family,  limb 
by  limb,  and  organ  by  organ,  is  being  born  into 
the  home  where  it  shall  dwell  eternally. 

A  touch  of  sadness  must  enter  here  into  all 
our  loves.  The  closer  we  twine  the  heart-strings, 
the  sharper  the  pain  when  they  part,  as  part  they 
must.  It  is  the  dire  necessity  of  life — death,  and 
the  heart-aches,  the  life  weariness  that  death  brings 
in  its  train.  The  family  stock  lives  on,  but  the 
old  leaves  drop  and  the  young  buds  expand  and 
occupy  their  room,  to  wither  and  die  in  turn. 
I^ot  only  has  Christianity  not  mitigated  the  phys- 
ical pain  and  the  fear  that  attend  on  death,  there 
is  a  sense  in  which  it  has  intensified  them.  There 
can  be  no  question  that  the  influence  of  the  gos- 
pel has  raised  to  a  higher  pitch  our  joys  and 


308  The  Home  Life. 

hopes.  Tlie  sensibilities  of  liiimanity  have  grown 
more  keen,  the  bonds  have  been  drawn  more  close 
in  homes  and  states.  Human  joy  is  a  higher 
thing,  pm*er  and  more  intense,  since  the  day  when 
one  could  say  m  the  name  of  Chiist,  "  Hejoice  in 
the  Lord  alioay,  and  agavn  L  say  rejoice  /  "  but 
with  intenser  joy,  also,  intenser  pain.  The  larger 
body  casts  the  larger  shadow,  and  as  humanity 
has  grown  in  strength,  dignity,  and  conception  of 
what  Hfe  means  and  life  is  worth,  the  pains  and 
the  fears  have  grown  with  it ;  there  is  more  at 
stake,  more  to  lose,  more  to  suffer. 

And  this  has  been  the  work  of  the  gospel.  It 
has  taught  us  how  to  love.  It  has  dignified,  pu- 
rified, and  consecrated  the  most  intense  of  the 
forms  of  love.  If  has  made  wedded  love  a  loftier 
thing  than  anything  of  which  a  pagan  dreamed ; 
and  it  has  added  fresh  strength  and  tenderness  to 
the  relationships  which  grow  out  of  the  home. 
But  it  is  not  afraid  of  increasing  in  the  circle  of 
light,  lest  it  should  increase  also  the  circumference 
of  shadow.  It  is  not  afraid  of  exalting  the  joys 
of  hfe,  because  its  pain  must  grow  more  intense 
by  the  same  rule ;  for  it  holds  that  life  and  joy 
are  the  conquerors.  Darkness  and  pain  are  for 
time,  light  and  joy  are  for  eternity.     In  strength- 


The   Whole  Family.  309 

ening  tlie  life,  the  love,  it  is  giving  to  us  an  eter- 
nal victory.  It  bids  ns  front  the  peril,  and  smile 
at  the  pain,  from  which  it  cannot  shield  ns,  be- 
cause of  its  abounding  power  to  bear  us  through 
it  and  beyond  it ;  and  to  complete  our  life  in  the 
world  where  there  shall  be  no  more  pain  for  ever. 
In  the  home  life  the  double  experience  is  realised 
most  intensely.  The  Christian  home  makes  most 
of  its  relationships,  and  the  gap  is  widest,  the  pain 
is  deepest,  when  the  circle  is  broken  in  upon  by 
death.  But  the  Christian  household  aims  at  a 
higher  completeness  than  the  life  of  this  world 
can  compass.  It  is  not  an  accident,  it  is  not  a 
stroke,  it  is  a  vital  stage  of  its  growth,  it  is  a 
grand  step  of  its  progress  toward  its  consumma- 
tion, when  its  dearest  pass  through  the  veil  and 
beckon  the  mourners  from  beyond.     For — 

II.  The  whole  family,  death  only  can  coni- 
plete. 

Death  has  a  double  aspect,  as  he  works  through 
Christ  or  through  Adam.  In  the  one  he  despoils, 
in  the  other  he  crowns  us ;  in  the  one  he  disrobes, 
in  the  other  he  arrays  us ;  in  the  one  he  breaks 
up  the  unity,  which  in  the  other  he  completes. 
Wholeness  belongs  not  to  this  world.     There  is 


310  The  Home  Life. 

no  whole  human  experience,  there  is  no  whole 
human  friendship,  there  is  no  whole  human  pos- 
session, which  is  all  contained  within  this  world's 
bounds.  I  have  endeavoured  in  a  former  dis- 
course to  prove  to  you  how  man  must  take  the 
eternal  into  his  horizon  of  vision,  if  he  is  to  un- 
derstand tnily  even  a  fragment  of  his  present  life. 
Like  some  cunning  royal  texture,  where  there  is  a 
peculiar  thread  running  through  the  whole  fabric, 
so  that  the  smallest  portion  tells  the  tale  of  the 
place  and  year  of  its  production,  there  is  not  a 
broken  bit  of  the  most  wasted  life  which  has  not 
some  feature  about  it  that  can  be  explained  only 
by  eternity.  And  if  we  can  say  it  of  the  basest 
fragment,  must  we  not  believe  of  the  noblest  fab- 
ric which  the  Lord  has  founded  and  edified  in  this 
world,  that  it  too  has  an  eternal  life,  which  can 
be  seen  in  its  completeness  only  "  in  the  general 
assemhly  and  Church  of  the  first-lorn  "  on  high. 
The  family  which  we  see,  that  portion  of  it  which 
earth  contains  at  any  moment,  is  but  a  ring,  a  link 
of  a  golden  chain,  which  is  dropped  from  heaven 
and  taken  up  into  heaven  again. 

Children  of  a  Christian  home,  it  is  sacred 
ground  on  which  you  are  standing,  it  has  been 
won  for  you  by  the  toils,  the  heroisms,  the  sacri- 


The   Whole  Family,  311 

fices,  perhaps  by  tlie  life-blood  of  godly  sires. 
That  family  tradition,  that  atmosphere  of  the 
family  life,  in  which  yon  were  nnrtnred,  which 
you  breathed  with  yonr  first  breath,  and  which 
has  lent  its  tincture  from  the  first  to  the  currents 
of  your  blood,  was  not  the  creature  of  accident  or 
even  of  words.  How  many  noble  lives  of  men 
and  women  do  you  reckon  in  your  line  %  How 
many  names  are  in  your  family  Bibles  which  are 
also  written  in  the  Lamb's  book  of  life  %  Step  by 
step,  perhaps  generation  by  generation,  the  fam- 
ily has  lifted  itself  to  a  higher  level,  has  attained 
to  a  wider  culture,  and  has  taken  a  larger  part  in 
the  affairs  of  life.  Who  shall  tell  what  brave 
struggles,  heroic  endurances,  wrestling  prayers, 
utter  sacrifices,  have  made  that  fabric  of  the  fam- 
ily life  and  the  family  fortunes,  v/hich  are  your 
rich  inheritance?  And  what  is  left  of  them — 
these  men  and  women  whose  sacred  dust  is  your 
vantage  ground,  and  whose  achievements  are  your 
heritage  ?  Is  it  simply  that  dust  and  those  sacred 
memories  ?  Is  a  memory  of  them  all  that  lives 
in  God's  universe  ?  And  when  you  die,  is  a  mem- 
ory all  that  will  survive  of  you  ?  It  was  for  you, 
for  their  children's  children,  that  these  men  toiled 
and  suffered ;  that  the  family  might  live  before 


312  The  Home  Life, 

God,  thej  watched,  and  wept,  and  prayed.  They 
are  gone,  but  have  they  borne  no  loves  and  vis- 
ions with  them ;  loves  that  cling  still  to  the  dear 
ones  who  hold  the  legacy  of  their  lives,  and  vis- 
ions of  the  time,  when  they  shall  see  of  their  trav- 
ail as  the  children  join  them,  and  gather  the  fruit 
of  theii'  toils  in  eternity  ? 

Surely  there  is  something  in  this  fanaily  stock 
which  has  a  real  existence  in  tlie  universe.  It  is 
not  a  name  only,  a  string  on  which  a  succession 
of  individuals  may  be  strung,  and  wear  the  ap- 
pearance of  a  unity.  It  is  re^ll  and  not  nomi- 
nal, a  thing  and  not  a  name.  A  thing  which  has 
a  clear  existence  before  the  eye  of  God,  and  which 
will  have  the  substance,  as  well  as  wear  the  ap- 
pearance, of  a  unity  in  eternity.  There  is  a 
whole  family  Hfe,  of  which  each  individual,  and 
even  each  generation,  is  but  a  section.  It  has 
a  distinct  form,  a  type  of  feature,  a  character, 
and  a  mission  in  the  world.  It  would  startle  us 
to  see  how  much  the  essential  characteristics  of 
families,  running  through  and  tinging  the  diverse 
members,  tell  as  a  distinct  and  powerful  element 
upon  the  development  of  society.  If  the  family 
is  to  nurse  the  individual  man  to  his  complete 
maturity,  it  is  that  he  may  continue  and  carry 


The   Whole  Family,  313 

out  the  influence  of  tlie  family  life.  Each  man's 
work  in  his  household  is  to  live  out  with  full 
freedom  the  special  capacity  for  life  which  is  in 
him ;  that  belongs  partly  to  him  and  partly  to  his 
race.  That  race  is  a  reality  before  God  in  its 
wholeness ;  it  has  a  speciality  of  gift  and  func- 
tion, and  a  work  in  the  world  which  it  only  can 
fulfil.  We  see  this  on  a  grand  scale  in  the  char- 
acter and  the  mission  of  nations,  but  it  runs 
through  the  whole  race.  The  man  and  his  be- 
longings, his  father's  fathers  and  his  children's 
children,  form  a  whole  which  enters  as  a  factor 
into  the  order^  God's  everlasting  kingdom.  The 
bond  of  the  household  is  not  accidental  and  for 
time,  it  is  essential  and  for  eternity. 

And  the  treasures  which  a  home  life,  such  as 
I  have  striven  to  picture,  gathers,  are  not  treas- 
ures of  this  world  that  can  perish  in  its  wreck ; 
they  have  the  mint-mark  of  heaven  on  them — 
they  must  pass  up  and  appear  on  high.  The  in- 
fant in  the  home  seems  to  be  the  poorest  and  most 
helpless  of  creatures  under  the  sun ;  poor  in 
power,  but  rich  in  right,  and  rich  in  love.  As  it 
grows  it  gathers  its  riches  round  it.  The  work  of 
life  is  to  lay  them  up  in  sure  storehouses,  "  where 
moth  and  rust  corrupt  noty  a/nd  thieves  hreah  not 
14 


314  The  Home  Life, 

through  to  stealP  The  child  learns  to  lay  its 
hands  on  the  tilings  that  are  needful  for  the  nur- 
ture and  culture  of  the  being,  and  to  lay  the  clasp 
of  its  heart  on  persons  whose  love  it  demands  by 
those  sui*e  instincts  which  never  fail.  Trace  child- 
hood on  to  its  maturity.  The  man  or  the  woman 
of  fifty  have  made  themselves  a  name  and  a  place 
in  life ;  they  are  the  centres  of  attraction  to  troops 
of  friends ;  they  have  sons  and  daughters  growing 
up  in  their  homes,  who  pay  to  them  the  reverent 
obedience  which  they  pay  to  the  Father  God. 
They  have  furnished  their  minds  with  knowledge, 
the  universe  has  unveiled  its  se^ts,  the  past  is 
peopled  with  heroic  forms,  the  future  with  visions 
which  the  eye  of  faith  alone  is  strong  enough  to 
behold.  How  rich  life  has  become  to  them,  how 
fuU  its  storehouses  of  knowledge,  power,  and  love ! 
Trace  it  a  stage  further.  At  seventy,  the  puling, 
helpless,  portionless  infant  has  grown  into  a  pa- 
triarch, whose  wdiite  hairs  are  a  crown  of  honour, 
before  which  all  men  joyfully  bow.  The  sons  and 
daughters  have  each  made  themselves  a  home, 
and  little  infants,  of  whom  he  has  all  the  joy  and 
none  of  the  care,  come  climbing  round  his  knee, 
and  twine  soft  tendrils  round  the  boughs  of  his 
Btrength;  lending  to  his  age  the  grace  and  the 


TliG   Whole  Family.  315 

cliarm  of  youtli  once  more.  His  wisdom  has 
grown  ripe  with  large  experience,  his  affections 
and  sympatliies  wide  with  frequent  ministries ;  he 
fills  the  place  of  a  prince  in  his  circle,  and  when 
he  falls  a  wide  company  of  men  feels  beggared 
awhile  by  his  loss.- 

And  what  does  his  fall  mean  %  What  but  that 
a  larger  and  loftier  home  circle  has  need  of  him, 
that  the  wise  and  the  good  who  have  gone  on  be- 
fore are  waiting  to  welcome  him  to  their  fellow- 
ship, to  lead  his  disciplined  and  ri]3ened  power  to 
the  work  for  which  God  was  training  it,  and  to 
rest  his  heart  in  the  home-life  of  heaven.  The 
rich  experience  of  which  the  home-life  of  earth 
had  been  the  parent,  would  make  the  heavenly 
life  strange,  and  even  foreign,  if  the  home  did  not 
reappear  beyond  the  river.  The  man  who  has 
been  nursed  to  a  noble  maturity  by  such  fellow- 
ship as  we  have  been  describing,  would  find  the 
higher  life  an  exile,  if  "  home  "  were  not  the  es- 
sential form  of  its  relationships,  if  love,  the  love 
of  kindred  souls,  and  the  intercourse  which  it 
generates,  were  not  the  essential  principle  of  its 
life.  The  patriarch  of  the  earthly  home,  passes 
out  of  it  to  be  joined  to  the  patriarchal  company 
— "  the  spirits  of  just  men  made  perfect,"  whose 


316  The  Ernie  Life, 

home-life  but  perpetuates  in  heavenly  forms  all 
that  was  best  and  dearest  in  his  mortal  pilgrim- 
age. And  there  too  the  infants,  "  the  flowers  that 
grow  between,"  whom  the  Angel  bears  early 
home,  find  loving  nurses ;  there  is  tender  training 
for  the  young  immortals  in  a  home  where  love 
rules  all  the  sphere. 

I  have  firm  belief  in  the  specific  uses  of  all 
the  faculty  that  is  cultured  in  this  world,  in  the 
life  of  the  world  to  come.  This  seems  to  me  to 
be  the  meaning  of  the  Apocalypse,  of  all  the  un- 
veilings  of  the  secrets  of  the  heavenly  life  wliich 
the  scripture  affords.  Its  simi)le,  honest  home- 
likeness,  to  me  is  its  broadest  and  most  striking 
feature — the  entire  absence  of  strangeness  in  its 
objects,  its  interests,  its  joys.  It  may  be  said  this 
presentation  of  it  is  a  concession  to  the  necessary 
imperfections  and  limitations  of  our  knowledge: 
that  the  things  unseen  can  only  be  represented  by 
familiar  images,  if  they  are  to  carry  any  sense  of 
realness  to  our  human  apprehension;  and  that 
the  fact  of  the  employment  of  these  earthly  im- 
ages conveys  no  absolute  truth  about  the  eternal 
world.  But  there  seems  to  me  to  be  an  underly- 
ing question,  the  settlement  of  which  may  modify 
our  judgment — In  a  being  like  man,  made  in 


The   Whole  Family,  317 

God's  own  image,  and  made  intelligent  by  God's 
own  liglit,  how  far  does  the  necessary  use  of  these 
human  images  cast  light  for  ns  on  the  nature  of 
the  realities  which  the  Spirit  employs  them  to  set 
forth?  The  forms  of  things  which  man  appre- 
hends, are  forms  which  God  has  shown  to  him ; 
the  question  occurs,  has  God,  so  to  speak,  two  sets 
of  forms,  essentially  diverse,  with  which  to  occupy 
the  intelligence  of  His  child  ?  Or  i^  the  one  the 
key  to  the  other,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Mount 
of  Transfiguration  ;  the  body  wearing  its  famihar 
likeness,  yet  aglow  with  the  awful  splendour  of 
the  celestial  world? 

I  believe  in  the  permanence  of  gifts  and  the 
perpetuity  of  culture.  The  artists,  the  thinkers, 
the  seers,  the  statesmen,  if  through  faith  they 
gain  right  of  entrance,  will  find  the  work  waiting 
for  them  which  they  loved  best,  and  were  best 
trained  for — their  joyous  task,  their  fruitful  min- 
istry to  humanity  through  eternity.  Men  live  in 
a  rank  here ;  it  is  the  secret  of  the  divine  order 
of  society ;  they  belong  to  a  race,  they  fall  into  a 
line.  Dying  in  faith,  they  fall  at  once  into  a 
kindred  rank  in  heaven.  And  there  alone  the 
wholeness  of  a  life,  of  a  home,  of  a  line,  can  ap- 
pear.    It  is  here  in  segments,  always  the  com- 


318  The  Home  Life. 

.plete  orb  is  liidden.  The  eje  of  faith  may  faintly 
trace  its  outline,  as  in  the  young  moon  on  a  clear 
summer  night ;  but  it  can  only  appear,  the  whole 
orb  illumined,  when  it  moves  with  full  face  op- 
posed to  the  Celestial  Sun.  And  here  we  trace 
Death's  loftiest  ministry.  This  wholeness  Death 
only  can  complete.  In  the  Christian  home  death 
is  the  fulfilment  of  the  highest  and  most  eager  of 
the  heart's  aspirations ;  the  hand  of  God,  adding 
to  the  beloved  the  touch  of  divine  completeness, 
and  lifting  them  to  the  home  where  the  whole 
family  will  at  length  be  one. 

III.  Yery  benign,  too,  very  precious  is  the  re- 
flex action  of  this  ministry  of  death  on  our  home 
life  here. 

That  He  may  bring  heaven  nearer  to  the  fol- 
lowing, he  separates  the  two  bands.  Life  never 
becomes  earnest  and  sacred,  as  it  was  meant  to 
be,  until  the  shadow  of  death  has  fallen  on  it. 
Those  only  who  have  questioned  the  face  of  the 
beloved  dead  know  what  is  meant  by  life.  A 
family  lives  but  a  half  life,  until  it  has  sent  some 
whom  it  has  clasped  in  its  embrace  to  join  the 
forerunners  whose  lives  "it  inherits ;  until  those 
whose  work  is  still  in  this  world,  in  spirit  can 


The  Whole  Family,  319 

cross  the  river,  and  fold  beloved  bnt  transfigured 
forms  to  tlieir  hearts.  Some  shadow  on  earth's 
sunlight  there  must  be,  and  the  darkest  of  all 
shadows  on  a  home  is  this  shadow  of  death.  JSTo 
agony  known  to  mortals  can  surpass,  and  but  lit- 
tle can  mate,  the  anguish  of  Eve,  of  Jacob,  of 
David,  of  Mary,  when  their  dearest  lay  dead. 
Eut  behind  it,  within  it,  rather  let  us  say,  if  we 
fear  not  to  enter  the  cloud,  lies  the  glory.  "  Said 
I  not  unto  thee^  that  if  thou  wouldest  helieve^  thou 
shouldest  see  the  glory  of  God?  " 

And  those  who  have  been  permitted  to  stand 
by  the  deathbed  of  a  noble  Christian  disciple, 
who  have  seen  him  sustained  and  possessed  by 
the  powers  of  the  world  to  come — the  dying  eye 
ranging  on  through  the  bounds  of  the  world  of 
sense,  and  lit  by  a  gleam  from  some  sphere  which 
was  beyond  our  sight ;  and  then  the  light  fading 
from  the  eye,  and  the  face  settling  into  the  awful 
but  beautiful  serenity  of  death,  till  it  put  on  the 
aspect  of  a  warrior  taking  his  rest  on  the  breast 
of  victory — ^have  known  a  moment  of  sublime  joy 
which  has  hardly  fallen  short  of v  transport,  and 
have  gone  down  to  the  common  world  again,  like 
Moses,  with  the  lustre  still  on  them,  and  with  a 


320  The  Home  Life. 

sacred  power  to  penetrate  the  inner  sanctuarieB 
of  tLe  hearts  of  their  fellow-men. 

Those  most  familiar  with  the  higher  aspects 
of  death  know  most  of  the  higher  aspects  of  life. 
To  them  the  common  ground  becomes  sacred,  for 
saints  who  are  at  rest  with  God  have  trodden  it ; 
the  common  duties  become  holy,  for  theylningle 
with  the  earthly,  the  thoughts  and  the  energies 
of  the  heavenly  sphere.  And  if  God  makes 
breaches  in  your  home  circle,  understand  the  lov- 
ing reason ;  it  is  that  lie  may  separate  the  one 
into  two  bands  awhile,  still  declaring  their  one- 
ness, and  so  may  marry  the  two  spheres.  The 
little  home  that  has  sheltered  you  in  its  sunny 
nook  has  expanded.  There  is  now  but  one  home 
everywhere.  Those  who  are  "  hone  of  your  hone 
and  flesh  of  your  flesh''''  are  treading  the  heavenly 
pathways.  How  often  as  you  gaze  longingly  on 
yon  fair  star,  do  they  cross  the  line  of  your  sight ! 
How  lovingly  will  they  welcome  you,  and  eiface 
all  strangeness  when  you  join  them !  Dear  hands 
will  one  day  lead  you  through  the  unaccustomed 
paths.  The  ba-inging  you  into  the  home,  the 
home  of  the  whole  family,  will  be  one  of  their 
most  intense  delights.  They  wait ;  they  share  the 
expectant  attitude  of  the  universe :  God  has  pre- 


The   Whole  Family,  321 

pared  some  better  thing  for  all  of  us ;  thej  with- 
out us  will  not  be  made  perfect. 

The  mother  who  has  seen  that  awful  pallor 
steal  over  the  brow  of  her  nursling,  and  the  life 
flicker  on  the  stiffening  lips,  knows  then,  and  not 
till  then,  the  sacredness  of  those  who  are  left  to 
her.  She  knows  that  she  has  to  train  them  for 
two  worlds — ^nay,  for  one,  for  that  godly  life 
which,  whether  here  or  there,  is  life  eternal.  J^or 
will  the  aged  pilgrim,  who  has  sent  all  his  dearest 
on  before  him,  tremble  when  he  too  stands  on  the 
brink  of  the  river.  His  heart  will  be  bursting 
with  joy  at  the  thought,  "  In  a  moment  the  veil 
will  be  lifted,  it  is  trembling  already,  and  my 
dead  will  be  clasped  to  my  heart  again,  to  be 
parted  no  more  for  ever."  The  image  of  Rachel 
came  back  to  Jacob  as  he  stood  on  the  shore  of 
the  dark  rolling  stream.  It  is  very  touching  to 
note  how  the  memories  of  her  mortal  sickness 
shaped  themselves  into  clear  images  before  his 
failing  sight.  "  There  I  hurled  Rachel^''  were 
among  the  last  words  on  his  dying  lips.  His  eyes 
were  dim,  the  forms  around  him  were  fading ;  his 
hands  drooped  wearily,  as  he  left  his  last  patri- 
archal blessing  to  his  sons ;  but  the  inner  eye  was 
lighting  with  a  strange  lustre,  was  flashing  with  a 
14* 


322  The  Home  Life. 

glorious  joy,  as  he  saw  Lis  living  Eachel,  sunlit, 
beyond  the  shadows,  and  his  arms  strained  forth 
with  no  faltering  motion  to  clasp  her  transfigured 
form,  and  gather  it  to  his  heart  of  hearts. 

lY.  And  what  assures  it  ?  Whereby  may  I 
know  that  the  vision  is  true?  I  see  it.  I  see 
"  the  whole  family "  gathering  there  in  the  sun- 
light ;  strong,  joyful,  radiant,  as  men  that  have 
won  a  glorious  victory.  My  heart  bounds  at  the 
thought  that  one  day  I  may  join  their  company, 
and  bear  my  part,  a  victor  too,  in  their  triumphal 
hymn.  And  whereby  may  I  know  that  it  is  not 
a  dream  ? 

There  are  few.  sensitive  natures,  I  imagine, 
which  do  not  shudder  sometimes  with  the  dread 
of  disembodiment.  "  Not  for  that  we  would  he 
unclothed,^''  says  the  apostle,  giving  utterance  to 
a  great  fear,  which  in  all  ages  has  preyed  on  the 
human  heart.  And  there  are  few  tender,  loving 
hearts  which  do  not  often  tremble  before  the  ques- 
tion, "What  if  all  personal  links  and  bonds  are 
snapped  in  sunder  by  death  ? "  The  fear  of  wan- 
dering forth,  a»  exile  from  the  flesh,  a  bloodless, 
bodiless  ghost,  was  the  great  tonnent  of  the  spirit, 
before    Christ   and   the   resurrection    had   been 


The  Whole  Family.  323 

preached  in  tlie  world.  And  the  fear  of  losing 
all  knowledge  of  dear  and  familiar  forms,  and  of 
being  cnt  off  from  all  the  holiest  associations  of 
this  life,  in  eternity,  has  haunted  the  Christian 
ages,  and  has  been  a  paralysing  terror  to  many  a 
true  Christian  heart.  But  these  notions,  the 
"  sleep  of  the  soul,"  "  the  disembodied  state,"  are 
just  the  bugbears  with  which  a  narrow  and  hard 
theology  has  oppressed  mankind.  In  truth,  the 
whole  mediaeval  conception  of  the  world  behind 
the  veil,  is  set  in  too  sad  a  key.  The  Church 
then  used  freely  the  tones  of  gloom  and  terror ; 
she  ruled  by  fear,  and  sought  to  terrify  men  into 
the  deliverance  which  her  sacraments  offered. 
But  her  influence  has  long  been  waning,  she  seems 
to  be  settling  into  her  second  childhood ;  and  now 
the  gospel,  whose  first  words  are  joy  and  hope* 
resumes  its  ministry,  and  good  news  about  God, 
about  death,  about  eternity,  are  everywhere 
abroad. 

The  soul  never  sleeps.  There  is  no  disem- 
bodied human  spirit.  The  definition  of  man  is 
"  an  embodied  spirit,"  and  it  cannot  be  the  very 
manhood  of  man  that  death  has»  commission  to 
destroy.  The  body  that  sin  has  corrupted,  death 
rends  in  pieces  and  buries  out  of  sight.     Blessed 


324:  The  Home  Life, 

be  God,  its  pains  and  frets,  its  stormy  passion,  its 
panting  lust,  lie  biu'ied  in  tlie  grave  for  ever.  But 
a  "  building  of  God  "  awaits  the  trembling  spirit 
in  the  moment  of  dissolution,  that  it  may  be  "  not 
unclothed^  hut  clothed  ujpon^'^  and  that  "  mortality 
may  he  swallowed  up  of  lifeP 

The  witness  of  this  is  the  Lord's  resurrection. 
The  gospel  of  those  wondrous  forty  days  which 
lie  spent  with  mortals  after  Ilis  passion,  when,  as 
Peter  declared  to  Cornelius,  "  He  did  eat  and 
di'ink  with  them,"  and  when  "  He  showed  Him- 
self unto  them  alive  by  many  infallible  proofs," 
reveals  to  us  the  embodiment  of  departed  spirits, 
and  unveils  to  us  the  homelikeness  of  the  heavenly 
world.  If  He  aimed  at  anything  by  those  famil- 
iar appearances,  iji  a  bodily  form  which  they  could 
fee  and  touch,  and  on  which  they  could  count 
the  wounds.  He  aimed  at  the  assurance,  not  of  im- 
mortality only,  not  of  resurrection  only,  but  of  the 
full  continuity  of  life.  All  that  constitutes  the 
interest,  the  work,  and  the  hope  of  life,  is  carried 
through  the  veil,  and  resumed  with  a  sacred  joy 
under  the  blest  conditions  which  here  we  pined 
for — the  conditions  of  a  sinless  and  eternal  world. 

Personality  obliterated!  Kindred  unrecog- 
nised I     Love  aU  drawn  off  from  the  creature,  and 


TU  Whole  Family.  325 

lost  in  God !  It  is  treason  to  tlie  Man  of  the  res- 
urrection to  imagine  it.  Personality  will  be  re- 
vealed, kinsMp  will  be  discovered,  love  will  be 
unbound,  when  the  blots  and  tlie  blurs  of  evil 
have  been  purged  from  tbe  spirit.  We  sball  see 
then,  what  we  knew  and  loved  in  part  on  earth, 
revealed  in  its  wholeness,  and  know  for  the  first 
time  what  to  live  and  to  love  may  mean.  I  know 
not  what  forms  the  recovered  ones  will  wear.  I 
know  not  how  the  dead  are  raised  up,  nor  with 
what  body  they  will  come.  Enough  for  me  that 
the  great  Forerunner,  the  great  Leader  of  the 
host,  was  raised  in  His  human  wholeness ;  each 
line,  each  touch,  of  His  dear  humanity  more  per- 
fect, than  w^hen  He  w^as  with  us  in  the  weakness 
of  His  mortality.  The  Lord  took  all  by  which 
man  might  know  Him,  and  for  which  man  might 
love  Him,  through  death  into  the  eternal  world. 
He  took  it  visibly,  that  we  might  have  assurance 
of  the  Invisible ;  and  that  we  might  hold  fast  the 
faith,  that  whatever  may  have  perished  of  our 
dear  ones,  whom  we  have  loved  in  the  Lord  and 
lost  awhile,  aU  that  made  their  dearness  lives  on, 
and  has  grown  to  a  divine  completeness  under  the 
touch  of  Death. 

We  may  perchance  have  had  some  glimpse  of 


326  The  Home  Life. 

the  image  wliicli  they  are  wearing,  in  the  moment 
when  the  fret  and  the  waste  of  life  seemed  to  van- 
ish, and  there  fell  on  their  faces  a  solemn  and 
holy  beauty,  as  they  settled  into  the  silence  of 
death.  One  has  often  seen  in  a  dying  face  at 
such  moments  an  ideal  beauty,  wherein  all  that 
might  be  possible  to  the  nature  seemed  expressed ; 
a  sign  and  a  prophecy  of  eternity.  Some  meet 
tabernacle  must  be  ready  for  the  spirit  when  death 
unbinds  it;  some  organ  of  intercourse  with  its 
fellows  and  with  the  great  universe,  or  the  tri- 
umphant language  of  St.  Paul  which  we  have 
quoted,  would  be  a  mockery  and  a  snare.  The 
dead  even  now  are  wearing  some  form,  which  fits 
them  to  mingle  in  the  great  congress  of  the  first- 
bom,  already  met  in  fellowship  on  high.  Eut 
nothing  even- there  as  yet  seems  final.  The  com- 
plete form  of  the  glorified  spirit,  the  body  of  the 
resurrection,  still  waits  the  trumpet-call  of  that 
last  great  day  of  God ;  the  day  when  the  work  of 
restitution  shall  be  finished,  the  day  of  the  full 
and  final  manifestation  of  His  sons. 

And  "  there  they  are  "before  the  throne  of  God^ 
and  they  serve  Him  day  and  night  in  His  tem- 
ple : "  one  band,  once  more,  met  again  and  met 
for  ever.     Hearts  long  sundered,  knit  again  in 


The  Whole  Family.  327 

immortal  fellowship ;  the  struggles  and  sorrows 
of  earth,  their  most  sacred  memory ;  "  the  far  off 
iiiterest  of  tears,"  their  most  dear  possession; 
brothers  of  an  order  of  which  Christ  is  the  Living 
Elder,  and  whose  consecrating  priest  was  Death. 


^     3HJ- JO 


THE     END 


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